Tupelo charges neighbor with Monday morning armed robbery

TUPELO – Police didn’t have to go far to find a suspect in a Monday morning armed robbery; the suspect lived right around the corner.

Wendell Scott Lambert, 54, who is living with his brother at a South Green Street residence, is accused of walking about 250 feet to a house on Chestnut Street and robbing a 68-year-old woman at gunpoint.

Tupelo police detective Charles Harvey said officers responded to 520 Chestnut Street around 10:30 a.m. on May 6 and the victim said a white male came to the door and asked if she needed her yard cut. She said no, and then heard a loud noise as the suspect kicked in the front door.

“The suspect pointed a gun at the victim and requested money,” Harvey testified during Lambert’s Wednesday afternoon initial appearance in Tupelo Municipal Court. “He took $296 in cash, a purple pistol and two cell phones.”

Surveillance cameras captured the suspect leaving wearing an Affordable Lock & Key sweatshirt, blue jeans and distinctive shoes running east on Chestnut and apparently throwing away the phones. The investigation quickly led police to Lambert. Police say a search of the house located the green-soled shoes but neither of the handguns.

Harvey said additional surveillance videos from other sources showed Lambert wearing the same clothes as the suspect leaving his house before the robbery and returning right after the crime.

Lambert was arrested Tuesday morning and booked into the Lee County Jail. He has been charged with armed robbery and burglary of a dwelling.

Public defender Dennis Farris questioned whether the two charges overlap and could create a double jeopardy situation. He argued that the armed robbery charge is duplicated in the burglary of a dwelling charge.

“We were in contact with the District Attorney’s Office, and it was recommended we present it the way we did,” said Tupelo prosecutor Richard Babb.

Judge Weir ruled there was probable cause to bind the case over to a Lee County grand jury. The question of bond was deferred until a preliminary hearing can be held to delve deeper into the possible legal problems with the two charges.

That hearing has been tentatively set for Thursday. Detectives are still trying to run down Lambert’s estranged wife. The couple is in the process of divorcing.

While Lambert was reticent to talk to police and requested a lawyer during the initial interview, he offered help Wednesday in court.

“You need her phone number?” Lambert asked the detective. “She don’t have that gun.”

Lambert has one prior felony conviction for burglarizing a Tishomingo County house in November 2013. He pleaded guilty to burglary in 2014 and was sentenced to seven years house arrest and five years of post-release supervision. Mississippi Department of Corrections released Lambert in May 2015, citing the “expiration of sentence.”