LAKE HAVASU CITY – A 12-year prison term has been imposed for the local resident responsible for a one-man crime wave last summer in Lake Havasu City. The punishment ordered March 19 for Tony Crawford, 41, was stipulated in a plea agreement.
Nine charges are dismissed in exchange for Crawford’s guilty pleas involving three crime scenes last August 5. Crawford has admitted opening fire upon an unoccupied home before committing robberies minutes apart.
Deputy Mohave County attorney Leah Nelson said the defendant was staying at his brother’s house on Mescalaro Drive when he fired approximately 26 rounds from a firearm into a neighboring residence that was unoccupied at the time. Nelson has indicated through pleadings that Crawford told police that he believed gang members occupied the home and that he understood an FBI agent had been killed there.
Defense attorney Daisy Mazoff said that Crawford suffered some sort of psychotic event and was overcome by unfounded paranoia. “He thought some people were after him,” Mazoff said during the sentencing hearing in Kingman before Mohave County Superior Court judge Derek Carlisle.
A case victim informed the Court that she was thankful that no one was home during the blitz of gunfire that damaged the residence. Her letter to the Court indicated the family was saddled with repair hassles and expenses but was moreover traumatized that Crawford destroyed their sense of peace and safety in their “sanctuary and happy place,” creating fear and vulnerability.
Nelson said Crawford drove from the house shoot to a South Palo Verde Boulevard convenience store whose clerk he robbed at gunpoint. She said he subsequently robbed another employee at gunpoint at the Pancho Villa Taco Shop on North Lake Havasu Avenue.
No one was hurt during the three-scene crime spree.
Lake Havasu City police sergeant Kyle Ridgway said an officer spotted the suspect vehicle and that Crawford tossed large wads of cash from the window during a three-mile pursuit that ended back at the Mescalaro Drive residential shooting site.
Crawford pleaded guilty to discharging a firearm at a residence and two counts reduced to attempted armed robbery for the holdups.
