Donna
11-17-2005, 08:30 AM
Who would have thought it was so easy to create a new identity?
--------------------
Prosperous Davie businessman unmasked as suspect in 1993 Miami murder
--------------------
By Andrew Ryan
Staff Writer
November 17, 2005
Davie * Behind the gates of the Riverstone development, where half million-dollar homes are nestled between ponds and tennis courts, police say a man had a secret.
Kenneth Conroy Smith lived on a cul-de-sac with a three-car garage, a Hummer in the driveway, an in-ground pool and a 12-seat indoor movie theater. He had two young daughters and ran a luxury auto transportation business.
But Kenneth Conroy Smith, police say, doesn't really exist.
His real name is Barrington Mabson Roach, 35, and he is scheduled to appear today in Miami-Dade County Court to face a 12-year-old murder charge. Police say he gunned down a 19-year-old high school student on a stormy night in Miami on June 5, 1993.
Officers captured Roach in Virginia a month after the crime, but he fought extradition, and Florida officials failed to send the proper paperwork.
After 84 days in a Virginia jail, Roach went free, records show. No trial.
"Why would they just let him go?" asked the victim's mother, Primrose Morris, 50. "It hurt. It hurt a lot."
Her son, Kevin Yates, was killed over a few hundred dollars, police say. He bought a lemon of a used car from Roach and wanted his money back, relatives said.
Yates' girlfriend gave birth to their daughter five months after he died. She's 12 now, and relatives say she has the same Cheshire Cat smile as the father she never met.
The FBI finally caught up with Roach in August. Neither police nor prosecutors called Yates' family to say his suspected killer was once again behind bars, family members say. Roach's re-arrest brings little comfort.
"They failed me once," said Morris. "I don't want to put up that hope and be let down again."
Kenneth Conroy Smith appears to have come into existence on Aug. 31, 1995, when Roach got a Florida driver's license at a mobile kiosk in Miami, records show. He used a bogus Social Security number that actually belonged to a woman, the FBI would later determine. But it worked.
Over the next 10 years, police would pull Roach over for speeding or running a stoplight at least seven times in three states, records show. Handing over identification that said Kenneth Conroy Smith, Roach always played it cool.
Officers never discovered that he was a fugitive running from a murder rap. His new identity was almost as good as a not-guilty verdict.
"He had the nerve to do it," said FBI Special Agent Chad Creasey, the lawman who finally unraveled the secret.
Roach's Miami lawyer, Kenneth Weisman, could not be reached despite more than six phone messages left seeking comment.
When fugitives are arrested out of state and fight extradition, federal law requires a governor's warrant to bring them back. A fugitive can be held for 90 days awaiting the paperwork.
In Roach's case, a warrant from then-Gov. Lawton Chiles' office never arrived, said Bernard Henderson, Jr., deputy secretary of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
The Florida governor's office never received an extradition request for Roach from prosecutors in Miami-Dade, said press secretary Deena Reppen.
The Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office disputes that.
"As far as we know, a letter was sent" requesting Roach's extradition in 1993, said State Attorney spokesman Edward Griffith. Griffith would not produce a copy of the letter and declined to discuss the case further.
Roach's 1993 release angered Yates' family.
"It's unfair for him to do what he did and continue to live his life like everything is OK," said Samantha Wallace-McLean, 30, the mother of Yates' daughter. "It's not OK."
Roach and his longtime girlfriend, EllisaWhittaker, moved constantly, records show, settling in Riverstone in 2003. They kept a low profile, driving past neighborly waves and avoiding conversations at the end of the driveway.
"They were not bad neighbors. I mean, they kept up their lawn," said Neil Gold, who lives two houses down in Riverstone.
The FBI, however, was on their trail.
In May 1994, Whittaker had told the FBI that she would never turn on Roach, the father of her daughters, said Miami FBI spokeswoman Judy Orihuela.
Over the next decade, the agency kept tabs on Whittaker, following public records up to New York and back. At each new address agents always arrived a few months after the couple had already moved.
Then an agent doing a routine database check earlier this year got a hit: a Weston home.
Creasey noticed that in 2003 Whittaker had bought a $194,500 home in Savanna, a palm-lined gated community off Arvida Parkway in Weston, from a man named Kenneth Conroy Smith.
Creasey pulled Smith's driver's license photo. He was looking at Roach, right down to the scar on his forehead.
Agents followed the trail to Riverstone, where Smith had bought a $478,860 home in 2003. They discovered that Roach and Whittaker were living together with their daughters in the home but were visiting in Los Angeles.
The couple flew home on Aug. 27. Agents met the plane at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport and grabbed the couple out of their seats.
Whittaker, the FBI said, swore that her companion was Smith. In another room, Roach tried the same.
Then Creasey plopped a copy of his 1991 driver's license photo -- when he was Roach -- in his lap.
"I just want to ask if you remember when you were this guy," Creasey said.
Roach stared at the photo.
"You figured it out," he replied, according Creasey.
--------------------
Prosperous Davie businessman unmasked as suspect in 1993 Miami murder
--------------------
By Andrew Ryan
Staff Writer
November 17, 2005
Davie * Behind the gates of the Riverstone development, where half million-dollar homes are nestled between ponds and tennis courts, police say a man had a secret.
Kenneth Conroy Smith lived on a cul-de-sac with a three-car garage, a Hummer in the driveway, an in-ground pool and a 12-seat indoor movie theater. He had two young daughters and ran a luxury auto transportation business.
But Kenneth Conroy Smith, police say, doesn't really exist.
His real name is Barrington Mabson Roach, 35, and he is scheduled to appear today in Miami-Dade County Court to face a 12-year-old murder charge. Police say he gunned down a 19-year-old high school student on a stormy night in Miami on June 5, 1993.
Officers captured Roach in Virginia a month after the crime, but he fought extradition, and Florida officials failed to send the proper paperwork.
After 84 days in a Virginia jail, Roach went free, records show. No trial.
"Why would they just let him go?" asked the victim's mother, Primrose Morris, 50. "It hurt. It hurt a lot."
Her son, Kevin Yates, was killed over a few hundred dollars, police say. He bought a lemon of a used car from Roach and wanted his money back, relatives said.
Yates' girlfriend gave birth to their daughter five months after he died. She's 12 now, and relatives say she has the same Cheshire Cat smile as the father she never met.
The FBI finally caught up with Roach in August. Neither police nor prosecutors called Yates' family to say his suspected killer was once again behind bars, family members say. Roach's re-arrest brings little comfort.
"They failed me once," said Morris. "I don't want to put up that hope and be let down again."
Kenneth Conroy Smith appears to have come into existence on Aug. 31, 1995, when Roach got a Florida driver's license at a mobile kiosk in Miami, records show. He used a bogus Social Security number that actually belonged to a woman, the FBI would later determine. But it worked.
Over the next 10 years, police would pull Roach over for speeding or running a stoplight at least seven times in three states, records show. Handing over identification that said Kenneth Conroy Smith, Roach always played it cool.
Officers never discovered that he was a fugitive running from a murder rap. His new identity was almost as good as a not-guilty verdict.
"He had the nerve to do it," said FBI Special Agent Chad Creasey, the lawman who finally unraveled the secret.
Roach's Miami lawyer, Kenneth Weisman, could not be reached despite more than six phone messages left seeking comment.
When fugitives are arrested out of state and fight extradition, federal law requires a governor's warrant to bring them back. A fugitive can be held for 90 days awaiting the paperwork.
In Roach's case, a warrant from then-Gov. Lawton Chiles' office never arrived, said Bernard Henderson, Jr., deputy secretary of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
The Florida governor's office never received an extradition request for Roach from prosecutors in Miami-Dade, said press secretary Deena Reppen.
The Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office disputes that.
"As far as we know, a letter was sent" requesting Roach's extradition in 1993, said State Attorney spokesman Edward Griffith. Griffith would not produce a copy of the letter and declined to discuss the case further.
Roach's 1993 release angered Yates' family.
"It's unfair for him to do what he did and continue to live his life like everything is OK," said Samantha Wallace-McLean, 30, the mother of Yates' daughter. "It's not OK."
Roach and his longtime girlfriend, EllisaWhittaker, moved constantly, records show, settling in Riverstone in 2003. They kept a low profile, driving past neighborly waves and avoiding conversations at the end of the driveway.
"They were not bad neighbors. I mean, they kept up their lawn," said Neil Gold, who lives two houses down in Riverstone.
The FBI, however, was on their trail.
In May 1994, Whittaker had told the FBI that she would never turn on Roach, the father of her daughters, said Miami FBI spokeswoman Judy Orihuela.
Over the next decade, the agency kept tabs on Whittaker, following public records up to New York and back. At each new address agents always arrived a few months after the couple had already moved.
Then an agent doing a routine database check earlier this year got a hit: a Weston home.
Creasey noticed that in 2003 Whittaker had bought a $194,500 home in Savanna, a palm-lined gated community off Arvida Parkway in Weston, from a man named Kenneth Conroy Smith.
Creasey pulled Smith's driver's license photo. He was looking at Roach, right down to the scar on his forehead.
Agents followed the trail to Riverstone, where Smith had bought a $478,860 home in 2003. They discovered that Roach and Whittaker were living together with their daughters in the home but were visiting in Los Angeles.
The couple flew home on Aug. 27. Agents met the plane at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport and grabbed the couple out of their seats.
Whittaker, the FBI said, swore that her companion was Smith. In another room, Roach tried the same.
Then Creasey plopped a copy of his 1991 driver's license photo -- when he was Roach -- in his lap.
"I just want to ask if you remember when you were this guy," Creasey said.
Roach stared at the photo.
"You figured it out," he replied, according Creasey.