Two teens suspected of three armed robberies in Goose Creek are in police custody.
Captain John Grainger of the Goose Creek Police Department said officers from the GCPD and Berkeley County Sheriff’s Office arrested St. Elmore Mack, 16, at a residence in the Sangaree subdivision of Summerville Tuesday evening of last week and transported him to the S.C. Department of Juvenile Justice Detention Center in Columbia. He is being charged as an adult.
GCPD and North Charleston Police Officers arrested a second suspect, 18-year-old Timothy Alan Lemon, at a residence on Popperdam Creek Drive in North Charleston. He is currently in the Hill Finklea Detention Center.
Both suspects are charged with armed robbery of a Dollar General Store at No. 5 Alliance Drive in Goose Creek.
Investigators are exploring possible connections between the Dollar Store robbery and two previous armed robberies at a neighboring business, the Ocean Isle Restaurant, which is located in the same shopping center.
The Dollar Store robbery occurred at about 8:30 a.m. Nov. 10 when two subjects, one of them armed with a rifle with a scope, entered the store and demanded money. The two suspects then fled on foot across College Park Road toward the College Park subdivision.
School district officials put Stratford High School, which is located adjacent to the shopping center, in lockdown by at about 8:44 a.m., Grainger said.
Grainger said this is the third robbery of a business in this shopping center in less than a month. The Ocean Isle Restaurant was robbed Oct. 25 and Nov. 7.
While GCPD has not confirmed that the same suspects have committed the three robberies, there are similarities in the cases.
According to a GCPD incident report, during the Nov. 7 robbery, a lone suspect entered the restaurant brandishing a rifle with a scope and carrying a black bag. He took about $100 cash from the register and fled on foot. The owner reported that, while he did not know the subjects, he believed he recognized the robber Nov. 7 from the Oct. 25 robbery.
Both suspects are awaiting bond hearings.