Arnold was convicted for killing a man here in 1998.
MUGSHOT; FILE PHOTO

One day after a gray hoodie-clad perpetrator accosted two female UVA students, taking one by the shoulder and forcing the other to withdraw money from an ATM before fondling her, police have made an arrest in the cases. And they say the suspect is a notorious local killer.

Thanks to a convenience store security tape, authorities arrested twenty-eight-year old Carlton William Arnold on Thursday, September 30, the day after the recent assault. He now faces a litany of charges that threaten to do what frustrated authorities failed to do before: put him behind bars for a long time.

Back in September 1998, when Arnold was 16, he was the shooter in the robbery/slaying at the Ivy Road Shell station. Clerk Osama Hassan, an Egyptian immigrant working the overnight shift, had been sitting in a wooden rocking chair on the store’s front porch when he was gunned down by a reported eight shots from a handgun.

One of the attorneys at the time claimed Arnold was challenged by an unusually malleable will, comparing his mental depth to the sheen of petroleum in a parking lot puddle. The file from that case shows that a court-ordered test measured Arnold’s IQ as 49 to 68, and a school psychologist reported that he had few social skills and could read no better than a first-grader.

As the myriad co-defendants— including a UVA student who allegedly had foreknowledge of the crime— lawyered up, then prosecutor Jim Camblos found himself dropping the charges against the UVA student and filing murder charges late against the alleged mastermind of the crime, Dylan L. Tyree.

“Justice wasn’t served in this case,” says political activist Randolph Byrd. “This was a pre-meditated robbery, and someone should have been charged and convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole.”

Thirty-one-year-old Osama Hassan had hoped to make a new life in America. Instead, his life ended with eight bullets to his chest. A year after the killing, Arnold was convicted of second degree murder and sentenced to 40 years with 27 years suspended.

In July of this year, Arnold was released. Police are now looking to see if he may be responsible for any other recent crimes.

For the two alleged UVA assaults, Arnold faces charges of abduction by force, robbery with a firearm, aggravated sexual battery, two counts of use of a firearm in the commission of a felony, and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

–last updated 4:14pm Friday