Not Guilty Ends Ordeal, Memories of Trauma Remain

 Cindy Swift has lost her ability to trust.

 Sitting in her modest Springettsbury Township home on a recent afternoon, the postal worker recounts the 14-month ordeal that she and her family have endured.

 Although her son was found not guilty of robbery after a trial shortly before Christmas, the anger remains.

 She and her husband Steve had to sell their Fawn Grove home where they lived for 24 years.  After neighbors, friends and coworkers heard radio and television reports and read newspaper stories about her son Derek being charged with robbing a Rutters store by the Pennsylvania State Police, The embarrassment was too much to bear.

 “It seemed like everyone was looking at us whenever we went out in the community,” Cindy says.

 Eventually they had to sell their home because they needed money, lots of money, more than $30,000, to prove their son’s innocence.

 That was a considerable sacrifice because Steve, a victim of two heart attacks earlier in his life, is suffering from other disabilities and is unable to work.

 ***

 From the Pennsylvania State Police report about the Oct. 2, 2006 Fawn Grove Rutters robbery:

 “A man came in around 12:30 (a.m.) and went into the men’s bathroom and came out and bought a bag of cheese fries, the(n) he left.  About 12:50 he came back in and asked for a box of Marlboro Reds.  When I turned to get the cigarettes, when I put them on the counter, he said something to me and I said, “What?” and he said play it safe and no one will get hurt.  I had not logged into my register yet so it took me awhile to get it open and he asked me what the hold up was, he got about $70 and grabbed his drink and cigarettes and left.  He was wearing a blue zipup sweater over a brown vest with a baseball cap.”  (Statement by the register clerk.)

 ***

 For the Swifts the nightmare began on a mid-October day shortly after noon when two state troopers pulled into the driveway while Steve Swift was grilling on his deck.

 “They asked if Derek was home and I said, ‘No, he is at work.  What is this about?’”  Swift recalls, sitting at his dining room table.  “One of the officers said no big deal, but a female was claiming Derek was making threatening calls to her.

 “This was so unlike Derek I said, ‘Are you sure you mean Derek?’

 “They asked where he worked and I told them I just knew he worked in New Freedom at a shop where they make hardwood flooring.”

 ***

 From the Pennsylvania State  Police report.

 “I (Trooper Sean P. Taylor) made contact with Derek Swift’s father.  He stated that his son was working at a flooring place in Shrewsbury.  He said that he did (not) know the name of the place.  He said that his son has been clean for quite some time and wanted to know why we wanted to talk to him.  (I never told him that his son was in any trouble.)

 “Tpr. Wise and I located his place of employment … We transported Swift to PSP York.  The entire time he was being transported he kept saying that “this is a mistake, and that we were setting him up.”  I explained to him that I would talk to him when we got to station.

 “…He was visibly upset and screaming that he did not rob the Rutters.  He said that he goes into the store every day and would not rob it because everyone knows who he is because he is strange looking.”

 ***

 Derek Swift is an albino.

 “He doesn’t like to be called that,” his father says.  “He has been picked on and teased about it his entire life.”

 After they drove him back to his car and released him Derek called his parents because the troopers would not allow him to call anyone and it was well past the time when he usually got home.

 “He was bawling uncontrollably,” Cindy says. “No one even knew the place was robbed.  We told him to calm down and tell us.

 “Later that night, we thought this would go away because the night before the robbery he was watching Sunday night football. His father went up at half time to his bedroom to talk about the game, but Derek was asleep.”

 “If he left the house at any time the dog would have barked,” Steve says.  “The dog always barks when someone comes or goes.”

 ***

 From the Pennsylvania State Police report (statement from the clerk who had been robbed):

 “A week after the robbery this guy came in and I got a really bad feeling when he came up to the register.  He walks just like the robber, he talks, coughs, and smokes the same cigarets.  So when he tried to use his credit card and it was denied I looked on my journal on my register and got his name off of the journal and it said Dereck (sic) Swift so I had my coworker call her mom and her fiancé to come up to Rutters because when Dereck’s card was denied he got really mad and said that he would be back.  And the night that he robbed me when he came in the second time he jokingly said that he was back again.

 “So when my manager came in I (told) her the name and she called her supervisor Steve Kissinger and he called trooper Taylor who came to my house the next week and asked me about how I felt and if I was sure it was him.  And I said I was.  Then I came to the police station and picked him out of a photo lineup.”

 “On 12/18/06 I (Tpr. Sean P. Taylor) filed a criminal complaint at District Court 19-3-3.  Swift was charged with Robbery, Terroristic Threats, Simple Assault, and Theft by Unlawful Taking.

 “On 12/20/06 the accused turned himself in …”

 ***

 The Swifts had retained local attorney Darryl W. Cunningham. He represented them during the preliminary hearing before District Judge John R. Olwert of Stewartstown on Jan. 31.

 It was at this point they heard the testimony of the two Rutters clerks and Tpr. Taylor.

 There were a number of peculiarities that emerged that day before Derek was bound over for trial.

 ***

 From the transcript of proceedings, preliminary hearing:

 “…he came in the first time – I just can’t remember what time – and had a hood up, and me and (the other clerk) looked at each other and we’re, like, we’re going to get robbed because who would come into a convenience store with their hood up and their head down the whole time?  And he bought something and then left, so we took a breath. And then we went about doing our work.  And I was cleaning and then (the other clerk) – like, I turned around, and she was waving her hands saying we just got robbed.  So I ran up there.”

 The hearing transcript indicates that the clerk had seen the robber in the store before.  When asked how she knew it was the same person she said:  “Because of the way he walked and the way he coughed, …”

 When asked if there was a security guard in the building, she responded, “Yes.”

 Asked if the clerks told the security guard about their fears of being robbed, she said “No.”

 When the clerk at the counter was asked if she alerted the security guard during the second visit she indicated she did not until after the robber had left the store.

 Neither clerk noticed anything peculiar about the robber although they said they could only see his face from the nose down.  There were no traits noticed that would indicate he was an albino.  And there was also a discrepancy about the height of the robber.

 ***

 In the months after the preliminary the family would begin to have new concerns.  They learned that this was going to be their attorney’s last case before moving to Virginia.  The District Attorney had a plea bargain on the table.  Instead of four years in federal prison, if Derek would plead guilty, they would recommend sentencing for a year in York County prison.

 “Derek was extremely fearful of going to state prison” says Steve.  “And, even though he didn’t do it, he was considering taking the one year because at least he would be in jail close to home.”

 Then Uncle Chad stepped in.  “Uncle Chad, who is a pastor, said, don’t take the plea bargain if you didn’t do it,” Steve says.

 Derek reiterated to his parents, “I never robbed anything.”                                                                    

 So they didn’t take the plea bargain and instead found themselves a new lawyer and a private investigator.

 Then the case took a 180 degree turn.

 ***

 Investigators from Archangel Investigations, began working in late July.  They spent hours reviewing the surveillance video and walked through the Rutters, following the path of the robber.  They found their first clue when they noticed in the video that the robber was shorter than an electrical panel that the investigator passed by.  That meant the robber would have had to be shorter than Derek.

 They spent some time outside the Rutters store talking to teenagers and young adults, gathering general information about “trouble makers.”  They subsequently were given the name of a young man who supposedly was involved in a Rutters robbery.

 They obtained mug shots and spoke with the young man’s step-mother.  The robbery he was alleged to have committed, however, was in February 2007 and involved a hand gun and the cooperation of a relative who was working at the Rutters.

 While the new information was disappointing, a major break was about to occur.  When Archangel's investigators showed the video to another friend of the alleged robber they were stunned when the young man bluntly stated he knew who it was.  And, it wasn’t Derek Swift.  Two other people in the home looked independently at the video and came to the same conclusion.

 Later, a young woman involved in a paternity case also positively identified the robber as the same young man.  Archangel's investigators were told this young man  was currently in jail in Maryland.  She provided other information about his personal habits and his walk that were clearly identifiable in the video.

 ***

 It took months before the Swifts were able to see the surveillance video and when they did they were convinced it was not Derek. 

 Now with the new information from the private investigator the Swift family suddenly felt positive about what might happen.

 “When we first heard about the report from Archangel about the misidentification and the fact that in the video the perpetrator appears to be considerably shorter than Derek, and that our attorney Dennis Boyle of Camp Hill was going to present the evidence to the DA, we were thrilled, we thought it was over.” 

 The trooper went to Harford County Prison in Maryland to interview the young man who had been identified in the video.  “He came back very quickly and said he was 6 foot tall,” Steve says.  “The trooper said the young man told him he didn’t do it.

 “Why would he believe him when he said he didn’t do it, but wouldn’t believe Derek or us?”

 But the jury did believe the evidence attorney Boyle presented that Derek was not the person in the video.  They found him not guilty on all counts.

 ***

 Derek believes the trooper had a different reason for not believing him.

 The trooper had come to the Swift’s Fawn Grove house with an ATF agent after a church fire earlier in 2006.  They wanted to know if Derek knew about the fire and possible drug dealing, but he wouldn’t tell them anything. 

 Derek says the trooper told him as he was leaving, “I’ll get you any … way that I can.” 

 “This screwed his life up,” his mother says.  “He got really depressed, didn’t care anymore.  He attempted suicide.

 “After he was arrested the news hit everywhere.  There was a headline in the Delta Star: ‘Fawn Grove Man Robs Rutters’ and it was about Derek.  When I called to complain that the headline already convicted him, they told me that anyone reading the story would see he was only arrested.  They didn’t correct the headline.

 “The story suddenly appeared on the radio and WGAL TV.  I was at work and had just told my coworkers about Derek being arrested when I  heard the report on the radio.  I broke down in tears and had to go home.”

 ***

 Derek admits he has been through some rough patches in his life.  He knows there are reasons why people might suspect him of doing wrong.

 He started using hard drugs after he quit high school.

 “I had a terrible spree with crack cocaine,” Derek says quietly while sitting at the kitchen table.  He talks about taking a prescribed heroin substitute to help him break his habit. 

 Now he says he is hoping for a new start in his life. 

 Meanwhile, for Cindy, trust in the police and the prosecutor’s office, something she believed in all her life, may no longer be possible. 

 On this day, however, they can trust in their family.  Steve looks at them both and says quietly, “Thank goodness for Uncle Chet.”