From: Bill Kearney
Massachusetts ‘Gaming’ Future
Casinos ‘BREED’ compulsive gambling degenerates who end up being criminals.
The Morning Call - November 8, 2012 - Man who robbed 80-year-old with Alzheimer's gets state prison
A diminutive man in rimless glasses and a good suit, Mark S. Smolow didn't look like the kind of guy who would duct tape an 80-year-old Alzheimer's sufferer and ransack his East Allen Township home.
As the son of a family well known in Easton's business and Jewish communities, Smolow's background didn't suggest someone who would commit the robbery in order to steal thousands of dollars of jewelry to fuel a out-of-control gambling addiction.
Man who robbed 80-year-old with Alzheimer's gets state prison
By Riley Yates
Of The Morning Call
November 8, 2012
A diminutive man in rimless glasses and a good suit, Mark S. Smolow didn't look like the kind of guy who would duct tape an 80-year-old sufferer and ransack his East Allen Township home.
As the son of a family well known in Easton's business and Jewish communities, Smolow's background didn't suggest someone who would commit the robbery in order to steal thousands of dollars of jewelry to fuel a out-of-control gambling addiction.
And the glowing words of his supporters — including three prominent lawyers — didn't mesh with a crime that Smolow had plotted for days, fully knowing the vulnerabilities of his victim.
"The rub is this," Northampton County Judge Stephen Baratta said at the 58-year-old Smolow's sentencing Thursday. "The rub is that the defendant obviously has two sides to his life, because apart from being a good father, a good friend and a socially responsible member of the community, he planned what was clearly a well thought out, though not sophisticated, crime."
Smolow, of Forks Township, will spend 21 months to five years in state prison after earlier admitting to burglary and robbery — a punishment that disappointed both the prosecutor, who wanted more jail time, and Smolow's defense attorney, who wanted him to serve a county-prison sentence.
"He didn't think twice about assailing a disabled man in order to steal from him," Baratta said. "And that doesn't make him very different from other criminals who come before me."
On April 2, Smolow wore a long brown wig and fake mustache when he knocked George Hyndshaw to the floor of his Versailles Square home, taping his hands and going straight for the bedroom, police said.
Smolow, who knew Hyndshaw's wife, Mary-Ellen, had been hired to install new blinds at the home. It was the same business that his parents, now retired, once built a reputation for in Easton.
"It was a terrible crime," a weeping Smolow told Mary-Ellen Hyndshaw in court. "Cowardly, and it victimized both you and your husband."
Smolow was caught after a neighbor became concerned after seeing him approach the home. Smolow ran out the back door, but dropped the wig, which state police traced to the Allentown costume shop where he had bought it more than two weeks before
As police investigated, Mary-Ellen Hyndshaw said Thursday, she incredulously told them that Smolow couldn't have done it. But soon a trooper called her with the news she had found so unbelievable.
"I was speechless," she said. "I almost fainted."
Mary-Ellen Hyndshaw lost an estimated $46,000 worth of jewelry, which Smolow must pay back. She said her husband suffered chest pains for a month, and that while he has forgotten, she cannot.
"I think [Smolow] was a good person too," she said. "We're all good people until we commit a crime."
On Smolow's behalf, nearly 30 people wrote letters to Baratta, insisting he will never offend again.
"I trust him in my home. I trust him with my family," said Daniel Cohen, one of two local lawyers who spoke on his behalf. "I think it was an aberration. A planned aberration, but an aberration nonetheless."
"Aberration doesn't even describe how unusual it is," added Philip Hof, the other attorney.
Smolow's actual defense lawyer was his own cousin, Michael Applebaum, who called the robbery "stupid."
"In my own mind, it was almost like he wanted to be caught," Applebaum said.
http://www.mcall.com/news/
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