2 arrested following violent home invasion
CLAY TWP — Two people are behind bars on $250,000 bail each following their arrests Monday in connection with a violent home invasion last month.
The defendants — Brandon S. Wissinger, 28, of Winfield Township and Janet N. Greiner, 29, of Parker Township — acted as getaway driver and lookout, according to authorities.
But state police believe two others were responsible for the Dec. 2 break-in at the house on Euclid Road, where they pummeled the 74-year-old man, tied him up with an extension cord and stole numerous guns and prescription drugs.
“More arrests are imminent,” Cpl. Timothy Morando said Tuesday morning. He would not elaborate, saying only that investigators have identified the two robbers.
Police said Greiner and Wissinger recently confessed to their roles in the home invasion, which left Robert Patterson hospitalized with severe injuries.
District Judge Lewis Stoughton on Monday arraigned both on felony charges of receiving stolen property and conspiracy to commit the crimes of burglary, robbery, theft and aggravated assault.
They also are charged with conspiracy to commit simple assault.
Morando credited good police work for solving the case.
“The investigators have been pounding the pavement every day,” he said. “We've been going non-stop on this.”
Police began their investigation about 7 p.m. Dec. 2, when a family member who had been staying at Patterson's house reported the crime.
The relative had been out hunting that day and returned to find Patterson badly beaten and bloodied.
A medical helicopter flew Patterson to Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh for treatment of serious injuries, police said — including a broken nose, two dislocated shoulders, a fractured ankle and several cuts on his head that required stitches.
Those injuries were consistent with what police described as being a “large amount of blood” throughout the house. Additionally, Patterson's belongings were strewn about the home.
During a hospital interview, Patterson told police he heard a knock at the front door at about 6 a.m. He answered and was met by a man asking to use the telephone. The man claimed he was having car trouble down the road.
When Patterson got out his cell phone and asked the man for the phone number, the man “pulled out a pistol and pushed his way into the residence.”
Moments later, Patterson recounted, he saw a second man who was armed with a knife. He, too, went into the house.
Both men demanded money, guns and drugs from Patterson.
Investigators suspect at least some of the people involved knew the victim and had previously been in his house. But Patterson was unable to identify either robber.
He told police the two men punched and kicked him, and the gun-toting robber pistol-whipped him several times.“They beat him pretty bad,” Morando said.During the home invasion, investigators believe one or both robbers left their blood behind. Morando said police are awaiting the results of DNA testing.Police were also able to lift several latent fingerprints from the home, he added, which are being analyzed.The robbers subsequently used an extension cord to tie up Patterson and left him severely injured on his living room floor.The men took “more than 10 firearms,” Morando said, as well as prescription medication from the house.But before leaving, one of the men made a phone call, according to court documents, telling the person on the other end of the line that “they would be coming out.”Morando said police believe Patterson was left incapacitated for about 12 hours before he was found.During the police investigation, video surveillance from a nearby home provided a key clue — a white pickup truck that was seen at 5:39 a.m. driving down the dead-end road.Investigators on Friday interviewed Greiner at the barracks in Butler Township. She admitted that about 4:30 a.m. Dec. 2 she received a call from the two suspected robbers, asking for a ride.Greiner said she was with Wissinger when she picked them up in a relative's white Dodge truck, which appeared to be the same one that was captured on surveillance footage.They drove to Patterson's house. Greiner said she and Wissinger stayed in the truck while the two other men got out.The defendants waited for about 30 minutes until she got a call from the men to pick them up.The men, she told investigators, “returned to the truck with multiple firearms, which they related they had taken from Patterson by use of force,” a police affidavit said.The men also described repeatedly hitting the victim. Greiner said the four then drove away.Wissinger corroborated Greiner's account, during a Monday interview at the barracks. He also allegedly acknowledged that he received two of the guns that were stolen from the victim.Police said Wissinger told investigators that he and Greiner later traded the guns for heroin.“Both are cooperating,” Morando said of the defendants, but he declined to reveal what they else told investigators.He said investigators are still processing the truck for any evidence. He also noted that police have not recovered any of the stolen guns.Anyone with information about the case is asked to call police at 724-284-8100.
