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Caretaker charged with stealing $85K from 91-year-old vet

Updated August 28, 2020 - 9:34 am

A man was charged last month with 15 counts of exploiting an older person after police accused him of stealing nearly $90,000 from an elderly man for whom he was acting as a caretaker.

When a 91-year-old man who had served 30 years in the military was brought to the hospital Feb. 13, bedsores on his back showed symptoms of impending gangrene, according to a Metropolitan Police Department arrest report. Maurice Robinson, 48, identified himself as the caretaker after canceling the victim’s in-home nursing care two weeks earlier, the report said.

Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center staff found nine severe bedsores on the man and said he was too old to undergo an operation. Police froze the victim’s bank accounts while investigating possible abuse, according to the report.

Investigators found evidence that between December 2018 and February 2020 Robinson wrote himself 23 checks, conducted 96 ATM transactions and bought Walmart items for himself 12 times on the victim’s card, totaling $85,801.50, the report said.

Robinson, who was arrested on a warrant Aug. 7, was charged July 1 with 15 counts of exploiting an older person and one count of neglect of an older person resulting in substantial bodily harm. He is being held on $25,000 bail, and if bail is posted, he cannot serve as a caretaker, according to court records.

Robinson has prior charges for using another person’s credit card and theft from 2002 and 2014, respectively. He was convicted Aug. 13 on one count of driving under the influence stemming from a case opened in March, court records said.

He is scheduled to appear in court Sept. 21.

Contact Sabrina Schnur at sschnur@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0278. Follow @sabrina_schnur on Twitter.

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