Anchorage police arrest new suspect in 2022 homicide after prosecutors say wrong man charged

Anchorage police arrested a 20-year-old man last week on murder charges related to a 2022 killing after state prosecutors said they arrested the wrong man based on the false testimony of two witnesses.

The case stems from November 2022, when 23-year-old Brad Robert was fatally shot in a Spenard mobile home park after he heard a disturbance involving two women and a man. He was shot when he went outside to help.

Police arrested Anthony Tinker III on murder charges about two weeks later.

A spokeswoman for the Alaska Department of Law confirmed Thursday that the wrong person was charged in the killing. Prosecutors dismissed murder charges against Tinker last week. He remains in jail on unrelated charges.

Another man, 20-year-old Vincent Sandifer, was charged earlier this month with murder in connection with Robert’s death.

Two other people, Jessica Elaine Lowe, 43, and Kathleen Juliette Lowe, 24, face perjury charges alleging that Tinker shot Robert, according to an indictment filed July 9 against them and Sandifer.

Sandifer is Kathy Lowe’s boyfriend, prosecutors say.

She and Jessica Lowe, her mother, were identified as witnesses after the 2022 shooting, according to Assistant District Attorney Paul Miovas, who is prosecuting the case. Both women said Tinker, a relative who lived with them, was the person who killed Robert, Miovas said in an email. That information formed the basis of the grand jury’s murder indictment, he said.

“The subsequent investigation and additional review of evidence led the state and law enforcement to conclude that Mr. Tinker was not, in fact, the person who shot Brad Robert on November 11, 2022,” Miovas wrote.

Robert’s girlfriend, Maryann Schneider, said this week that she was with him at the house the night of the shooting. Schneider, in an interview Thursday, said she saw only the silhouettes of two women and a man outside but heard the man fire several shots before fatally striking Robert.

One woman was hanging on the other’s arm, begging to go home, Schneider said. “Brad went out there to separate the one in distress from the others and save her as best he could.”

Schneider said she was initially disappointed when the prosecutor handling the murder case called her to inform her of the confusion surrounding the charges.

“I was definitely frustrated when they broke the news,” she said. “I was like, ‘OK, how do you know you have the right person this time?’”

But, Schneider said, she was impressed with the prosecution team and their thoroughness. She said the person who shot her boyfriend did not appear to show any remorse that night.

The public defender representing Tinker did not respond to requests for comment Thursday.

Two women, now identified as Jessica and Kathy Lowe, told police in November 2022 that Tinker was acting erratically before the shooting and had fled their home, so they followed him and saw him shoot Robert, according to a summary of police reports filed with the charges.

Tinker, 30, was jailed in mid-November 2022 on multiple felony charges stemming from a series of crimes that occurred in the days after the shooting. He appeared in court about two weeks later on a murder charge.

Tinker was still being held at the Cook Inlet Detention Center on the same charges Thursday, according to a Department of Corrections spokeswoman.

The remaining charges stemmed from what police described as a series of aggressive acts involving Tinker three days after the shooting. Officers were called to an address on Minnesota Drive on what police said at the time was a report that Tinker was suffering some type of “mental health episode.”

He was taken to a hospital for psychiatric treatment and released with a taxi voucher, they say. He stole a taxi, crashed it and then stole another car in an armed robbery, police say. Tinker then locked himself in an apartment with a gun and was arrested after an hours-long standoff with police on multiple charges, including armed robbery, burglary and vehicle theft, they say.

According to the state court database, tests were conducted that found Tinker to be competent to stand trial.

Police issued a warning last week about a SWAT call to West Dimond Boulevard involving Sandifer that did not mention Tinker. There was also no new information about Sandifer’s alleged role in Robert’s death.

Police said they learned of Sandifer’s whereabouts on July 11 and arrested him that evening. An update the next day described him as the “second suspect” in the November 2022 killing. Sandifer was booked into the Anchorage Correctional Complex on an arrest warrant for first- and second-degree murder, the release said.

Police Department spokeswoman Renee Oistad declined to answer questions about what information led detectives to Sandifer, saying the investigation is “ongoing and open” and has not been resolved by the courts. Witness statements initially led police to Tinker, Oistad said.

Sandifer pleaded not guilty at a preliminary hearing Monday and remained in custody at the Anchorage Correctional Complex on Thursday on $500,000 bail.

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