Man accused of trying to kill neighbors faces judge
A man accused of trying to kill four people, including a 6-year-old girl, will be held in jail without bond, a judge ruled Tuesday.
Robert Louis Singletary, 24, was indicted on four counts of attempted first-degree murder, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, possession of a firearm by a felon, and interference with an electronic monitoring device.
Singletary is accused of firing at several of his neighbors in his Crowders Mountain neighborhood on April 18 after a child's ball rolled into his yard. Jamie White was struck in the back, his wife, Ashley, was grazed in the elbow, and their 6-year-old daughter, Kinsley, had pieces of shrapnel lodged in her cheek.
Singetary faced Senior Resident Superior Court Judge Judge David Phillips for the first time on Tuesday. During the hearing, District Attorney Travis Page asked that Singletary be held without bond. Page said that Singeltary was convicted in 2017 of shooting two people in Mecklenburg County. He was released from prison in 2020.
Additionally, Singletary was out of jail awaiting trial on charges stemming from an incident in which he allegedly beat a woman in the head with a sledgehammer.
According to search warrant documents, the woman, Lauren Friday, told police he hit her in the back of the head and in the mouth with the sledgehammer, then refused to allow her to leave. He forced her to change her clothes and take a shower, and he photographed her injuries with a cell phone, the documents state. Singletary got out of jail about two weeks after the Dec. 2 incident, after his $250,000 bond was unsecured.
In addition, after the alleged shootings in Crowders Mountain in April, Singletary is accused of cutting off his electronic monitoring device and fleeing to Tampa, Fla., where he eventually turned himself in to police.
White was hospitalized for his injuries but has since been released.
He said in an interview after the court hearing that he was satisfied with Phillips' decision not to grant Singletary a bond.
"I'm doing as best as I can for the circumstances I've been in. It's going to be a long road to recovery," he said.
Ashley Hilderbrand said that Kinsley, while physically okay, has been having nightmares about Singletary.
"She woke up last night and said, 'Mommy, I had a bad dream. That man, that man, he was in my room, just me and that man, Mommy,'" Hilderbrand said. "I just got her to where she wasn't scared of the dark. She's scared of the dark again."
This article originally appeared on The Gaston Gazette: Man accused of trying to kill neighbors faces judge
