From left: Melissa Beacom, Robert Jack and Matthew Bates. Beacom allegedly solicited Bates and Jack to shoot her 71-year-old mother, Alice Robson, to death on Dec. 11, 2023, at her home near Pittsburgh because of a child custody dispute. (Westmoreland County Prison)
A woman in Pennsylvania upset with her mother over a child custody dispute arranged to have two men fatally shoot the 71-year-old woman in the head, prosecutors allege.
The Westmoreland County Prosecutor’s Office said in a news release that the principal at a school in the local district called the St. Clair Township Police Department on Dec. 13 after home health care workers found a child who was in need of 24-hour care at home alone and his caregiver, Alice Robson, was nowhere to be found. Police contacted Westmoreland County detectives who later determined Robson, who was also the boy’s grandmother, had been missing since Dec. 11.
On Dec. 14, cops and the Greensburg Fire Department’s bloodhound team responded to Robson’s home on Furnace Lane in St. Clair Township outside Pittsburgh to search for her. The dogs alerted authorities to an unfinished crawl space beneath the rear porch of the home. Cops found Robson’s body there, concealed by a panel and covered by debris, prosecutors said. She had been shot twice in the head.
Detectives searched the home where they found blood stains in the living room. They later learned 18-year-old Matthew Jason Bates, the boyfriend of Robson’s granddaughter, was at the home the night of Dec. 11. Bates told investigators 49-year-old Melissa Beacom, who is Robson’s daughter, brought him to the home to fix a car. According to prosecutors, Bates said Beacom and Robson had a “tumultuous relationship” over the custody of Robson’s grandson.
Investigators in Pennsylvania found 71-year-old Alice Robson shot to death under the porch of her home near Pittsburgh. Her daughter, Melissa Beacom, allegedly arranged to have Matthew Bates and Robert Jack kill Robson over a child custody dispute. (Robson obituary)
Beacom had asked Bates, 18, to kill Robson on “multiple occasions,” including that evening, he allegedly told detectives. Bates and Beacom left the Robson’s home and he returned with his buddy, 18-year-old Robert Patrick Jack.
“Detectives were told the two entered the home, two shots were fired at Robson’s head, killing her,” the news release said.
Bates and Jack then moved her body under the crawl space and tried to clean up the mess in the house, prosecutors allege.
Beacom is charged with two counts of conspiracy to commit criminal homicide and criminal solicitation. Prosecutors charged Bates and Jack with criminal homicide, conspiracy to commit criminal homicide, abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence. All three are at the Westmoreland County Prison without bail. Their next court hearing is scheduled for Dec. 29.
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