File photo / Ed Runyan Gregory Richardson II attends a hearing in December in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. A witness to a dollar-store robbery testified then to realizing after the robbery that the suspect is Richardson, whom she has known 20 years.

YOUNGSTOWN — Unique tattoos on his face played a role in the identification of a masked robbery suspect.

Judge Anthony D’Apolito on Thursday summarized testimony given at an evidence suppression hearing one month ago. He explained several key issues considered regarding a witness’s identification of Gregory D. Richardson II as the suspect in a Dec. 19, 2020, Glenwood Avenue dollar-store robbery.

The judge’s comments came during a hearing in Richardson’s case in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. The judge said he considered the amount of description of the suspect given by the witness, and the judge mentioned that the witness had known Richardson for 20 years. The suspect was wearing a mask.

But another key consideration in deciding to allow the witness identification to remain in evidence in Richardson’s case is the “unique” appearance of Richardson, the judge said. He has many tattoos on his face and neck.

“I think she noted that this is a unique alleged perpetrator in that he was so unique in his appearance,” the judge said of the woman’s testimony. “If he had not had these tattoos, this might have been a different analysis.”

Richardson’s appearance “led to the court’s conclusion that the accuracy of the description was satisfactory” due to “the different things concerning his appearance that the witness remembered,” the judge said.

The witness said she could see parts of the robber’s face and neck and was “100 percent sure” it was Richardson, she testified. Richardson is her niece’s uncle, she said.

She did not tell police when they initially investigated the robbery because she didn’t know if it was him at that time, and “I didn’t want to accuse somebody if I wasn’t sure.”

Richardson attended Thursday’s hearing by video from the Mahoning County jail. As Richardson did during the evidence suppression hearing in December, he wore large sunglasses during Thursday’s hearing despite being indoors in the jail.

The judge’s decision means that the witness will be allowed to testify at Richardson’s trial set for Feb. 7.

The judge noted that a photo identification of Richardson that a Youngstown police detective carried out with the witness did not comply with Ohio law because he showed the witness only one photo. But the judge “also had to consider other factors,” including the fact that the witness had known Richardson for two decades, D’Apolito said.

SEPARATED

Richardson’s indictment contains the aggravated robbery allegations involving the dollar store, but it also accuses him of aggravated murder and murder in the killing of Jolanda Murry, 27, three days later as Murry was riding in a car on Halleck Street on the North Side.

Richardson’s attorney, Lou DeFabio, had asked D’Apolito to split the robbery and murder into separate cases, and the judge agreed to do that after explaining all of the factors he considered in coming to that decision.

He said it is apparent that the robbery and murder are “not, to this court’s finding, part of the same act or transaction. They are not connected,” and therefore should be tried separately, he said.

The judge said he hoped to try one of the two cases Feb. 7. Prosecutors will have to let the judge know which case they wish to be tried first, he said.