According to the April 26, 1996 edition of the Baltimore Sun, officers popped open the trunk of a car at police headquarters on April 25th and found the body of a 61 year old man whose slaying is as mysterious as how he ended up there.
A police dog trained to locate blood sniffed through the 1989 Ford Tempo shortly after it was found 2 days earlier but to no avail, police said. So they towed the car to the garage at police headquarters, where Charles August Robinson's body lay overnight unbeknown to anyone. "No missing person report had been filed and the dog didn't pick up the scent...we had no reason to think anything was wrong." said police.
Mr. Robinson was last seen earlier Tuesday night leaving he Democrats Club, a group of senior citizens who meet at Fairmount Avenue and Franklintown Road in West Baltimoe. A noted pinochle player, Mr. Robinson had played several rounds with his friends before leaving about 6PM.
"He said goodbye, got in his car, made a u-turn and went up the street." said Wison Davis, a club member and friend. A city patrolman found the car about 2AM blocking traffic in the 3500 block of Winterbourne Road. Police checked the registration of the car and determined it belonged to Mr. Robinson, a retired country-club golf caddy who lived in the 3400 block of Wild Cherry Road in Woodlawn. At the time no one suspected that Mr. Robinso had met with foul play and the car was towed, police said. Investigators said he died from a severer head wound. The motive for the killing isn't known. Police described Mr. Robinson as an unlicensed cab driver, although his fiancee, Ms. Betty Tunstall, said he only provided rides to senior citizens that he knew. Ms. Tunstall had planned to marry Mr. Robinson at the end of the year.
"It's a very mysterious situation," she said. "He was a beautiful person who never hurt anybody. He sure didn't deserve to end up like that."
A check of the Judiciary Case Search showed that Mr. Robinson had no criminal infractions, other than failing to obey a traffic control device in 1996.