Charges against 19-year-old accused of robbing elderly women sent to grand jury

The witness raised his left fist and mimicked a punch, eliciting gasps from the gallery of Judge Clarence Shattuck’s Hamilton County General Sessions courtroom.

The man was demonstrating what he said he saw last month in the Northgate Mall parking lot when a 71-year-old woman was robbed while walking to her car after a meal with her grandchildren.

The witness, who the Times Free Press is not naming, testified he saw a man strike the woman with a closed fist, grab her purse and flee between 6:30 and 7 p.m. on Jan. 12.

Later that night, the witness picked 19-year-old Carlos Kirksey out of a photo lineup as the perpetrator. The witness said he chased the suspect through the parking lot and had gotten a good look at his face.

Kirksey was charged with robbery in that incident, and since has been charged in a similar robbery of another elderly woman that occurred eight days earlier at a Mapco gas station on Highway 58.

Shattuck bound both robbery charges to a grand jury Tuesday, even as a public defender staged a defense of Kirksey, who was not present in the courtroom.

Kirksey’s attorney brought his client’s alleged role in both robberies into question during cross-examination of both women, the witness and a Chattanooga police officer who investigated the Northgate Mall incident.

His questioning of the Jan. 4 victim centered on the fact she pinpointed Kirksey as the thief only after photos of him circulated in media reports following the mall robbery.

But the victim of the Mapco robbery, who is 80, testified she had seen Kirksey before, that he is an acquaintance of her grandson, refuting the implied notion she may have been compelled to identify Kirksey because his name and face were attached to another similar incident.

She testified that Kirksey said hello to her as she walked out of the gas station before he grabbed her purse and jumped in a car that sped away from the scene.

Kirksey remains in the Hamilton County Jail on $50,000 bond.

Contact staff writer David Cobb at dcobb@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6249.