(Stillwater, Okla.) – A Drumright man has been ordered to appear before a Payne County judge this afternoon on charges of breaking into a Cushing woman’s home on May 27, robbing her at gunpoint of medication as well as her cell phone, and stealing her 2014 Honda Insight – with his alleged accomplice, an ex-convict from Agra.
Zachary Alexander Love, 20, of Drumright, who was arrested Friday, was being held in the Payne County Jail today on $50,000 bail on charges of first-degree burglary of a house in the 1100 block of E. Fifth Street in Cushing, armed robbery of the female resident, and larceny of her motor vehicle, court records show.
Jacob Clifford Cushenbery, 25, of Agra, who previously lived in Cushing, has not yet been formally charged in the home invasion, but he was named as Love’s co-defendant in court documents filed Friday.
Cushenbery has been held in the Payne County Jail on $25,000 bail since his arrest in rural Yale on May 27 by Payne County Sheriff’s Lt. Nick Myers on suspicion of possessing two stolen vehicles, court records show. Cushenbery has been ordered to appear in court Wednesday for a pre-trial hearing on an amended charge of possessing a 2011 Chevrolet Cruze stolen from an Oilton woman and attempted escape from arrest, both on May 27.
Payne County Sheriff’s Investigator Brandon Myers wrote in an affidavit filed Friday that Cushing police were sent at 2:26 a.m. on May 27 to the Cushing hospital’s emergency room on a reported robbery.
The victim “reported that she was asleep on her couch when she heard a loud noise coming from her bedroom. She got up to investigate and found two masked men in her house.
“The men took her to the kitchen, tied her up, held her at gunpoint, ransacked her house, stole her medicine from her purse, her cell phone and ultimately her car. During the incident, one of the subjects drank from a tea jug that was in the residence. She told the officers that one man was tall and the other was short.
“Officers found a screen off of a window in the southwest bedroom and a fresh smeared fingerprint. A few days after the robbery, (the victim) found a brown-handled revolver among the ransacked items that did not belong to her,” the affidavit said.
“The same day at about 8:30 a.m. Payne County deputies and Yale fire were dispatched to one/eighth of a mile east of Eagle Road on Phillips Road for a car fire. The car was crashed into the ditch and fence and was on fire,” the affidavit said. The car belonged to the Cushing woman, the affidavit alleged.
While the car fire was being put out, two men, later identified as Love and Cushenbery, were at a residence about one-fourth of a mile south — where Cushenbery attempted to take a pickup, the affidavit alleged.
“Jacob (Cushenbery) was able to get a ride to Oilton where he stole another vehicle and was arrested later that day at Log Cabin and Norfolk when the stolen vehicle he was driving ran out of gas,” the affidavit alleged.
The Cushing woman said “about five to six months prior to the robbery, she had to kick Zachary (Love) out of her house,” but she had never heard of Cushenbery, the affidavit alleged.
When the sheriff’s investigator interviewed Love on July 6, “At first he denied any involvement. He then tells me that he knew that Jacob (Cushenbery) was going to rob her, but he did not take any part in it,” the affidavit alleged.
“He continued to deny any involvement in the robbery, but admitted he was picked up the next day by Jacob (Cushenbery) and was getting a ride to Tulsa. He said that Jacob (Cushenbery) went crazy and just crashed the car and set it on fire. Zach (Love) denies knowing it was stolen until Jacob (Cushenbery) told him it was after it was on fire,” the affidavit alleged.
“On Aug. 14, 2018, OSBI was able to isolate a complete male DNA profile from the tea jug submitted by Cushing police. The DNA profile matched Jacob Cushenbery’s offender profile in the state’s Combined DNA Index System,” the affidavit alleged.
According to Creek County court records, Love, who previously lived in Red Rock, Texas, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of marijuana possession in Drumright on March 28, 2016, for which he was given a 15-day jail term. Love also pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of malicious injury to a jail cell lock in Drumright on March 28, 2016, for which he was initially given six months’ probation that was revoked in May to a 30-day jail term.
According to Payne County and state Department of Corrections records, Cushenbery was released from prison in June 2015 after serving one year of three concurrent three-year prison terms for crimes in Cushing:
* unauthorized use of a vehicle in 2011 for which he was originally given a five-year suspended sentence in 2012 with an order to enroll in and successfully complete the Payne County Drug Court program from which he was terminated in 2013 followed by his probation revocation in 2014;
* second-degree burglary in 2012 for which he was originally given a seven-year suspended sentence in 2012, with the condition of successful completion of Drug Court after which he was terminated and his probation revoked in 2014;
* drunk driving in 2013 for which he was given a three-year prison term in 2014.
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