A suspect in the brutal November robbery of an elderly couple on Morningside Drive will be arraigned on Aug. 10 at the Torrance Courthouse.
Rodolfo Sanchez, 28, of Hacienda Heights, was arrested on May 12. DNA evidence found at the crime scene implicated him, according to police.
Fred and Kathy Stanger had just returned home from Hustler’s Casino around 10:15 p.m. on Nov. 25 when Fred was attacked by some men in his kitchen. The men, who had been in the process of burglarizing the house, tied up Fred and held guns to the couple’s heads as they ransacked their house.
“It was just like a movie,” said Kathy the following afternoon. “I thought, ‘Is this really the way I’m going to go out, by getting shot in the head?’”
In addition to jewelry and wallets, the four men stole at least 10 of Fred’s guns, he said. The group escaped a couple of hours later without neighbors hearing or seeing anything.
Another suspect, Milton Terry Lavender, 28, of Los Angeles, is wanted by Manhattan Beach Police in the crime, as well by Los Angeles Police for a home invasion robbery.
Sanchez was waiting to be sentenced for another crime, receiving stolen property, to which he pled guilty and had posted $20,000 bail, when he was arrested in the robbery of the Stangers. He is scheduled to be sentenced for that crime on Sep. 9.
Sanchez was convicted twice before, once in 2009 in Orange County and once in 2010 in LA County, for fleeing a police officer in a car. ER
