An anonymous caller tipped Avon police off about one of the Jackson Street home invasion suspects after hearing about his involvement from the suspect's girlfriend, police said in the court affidavit for the case.
Avon police arrested Michael Cyr, 21, of Harwinton, in January as one of two suspects who police said barged into a single-family home in town on Dec. 18, demanded money at gunpoint and fled on foot. He has pleaded not guilty in the case.
Police most recently arrested his suspected accomplice, Alex Molon, 19, also of Harwinton, on St. Patrick’s Day in March. Police said Molon knew the victims and came up with the robbery plan.
Police met with the anonymous caller — referred to in the arrest warrant as the “concerned citizen” — on Jan. 4, a few days after the individual hung out with Cyr and some friends on New Year’s Eve in Willimantic. After Cyr’s girlfriend told the individual that Cyr said he was involved in “robbing a house in Avon,” Cyr grew angry, stating “I can’t believe you told her,” the individual said in a statement to police. He then told the concerned citizen, “I didn’t want you to think differently of me” and that someone he knew was “texting him about committing another robbery,” according to the affidavit.
The same night, Cyr asked the concerned citizen’s cousin “about obtaining guns without serial numbers” and was carrying a pistol at an apartment party, the concerned citizen told police. The individual asked Cyr to store the gun in another location while at the home, police said. Police believe the gun to be one of the weapons used in the home invasion, according to the arrest warrant.
Police discovered a picture of two semi-automatic pistols similar to the victims’ description of the home invasion weapons on Cyr’s Facebook page, according to the arrest warrant.
Victims — a mother, her adult daughter and one of the daughter’s friends — called 911 to report the Jackson Street robbery at 7:42 p.m. Dec. 18.
Cell phone records police obtained through an ex-parte court order indicate that Cyr’s cell phone received and made calls using a Darling Drive cell phone tower about six-tenths of a mile from the crime scene at 6:52 and 7:16 p.m., according to the arrest warrant. Cyr did not use his cell phone again until 7:50 p.m., making a “mobile data transmission” near a cell phone tower by Route 44 in Canton, police said. He also called someone at 8:03 p.m. near Bakersville on Route 202, police said.
“These times and locations of Cyr’s cell phone usage correspond with someone having been in the area of the crime prior to the incident as well as moving away from area [sic] shortly after the incident,” police wrote in the arrest warrant.
When Avon detectives met with Cyr’s girlfriend of three months, she told them that Cyr notified her via either text message or phone that he “was ‘staking’ out a house that he was going to steal money from” and that he was with a friend who had “previously purchased drugs from this house,” according to the arrest warrant. While he didn’t state his location, he did tell her to use Life 360 – a smart phone application that identifies where a person is calling from, according to the app description. The app showed that he was in Avon, the girlfriend told police.
Cyr called her the next morning to say he was going home, telling her that he and his friend stole about $1,000 “in cash” and “some drugs” that his friend planned on selling, the girlfriend told police. She also said in her statement to police that Cyr told her “he used his gun during the theft” and that she had seen him in possession of “two silver and black colored handguns in the past.”
At the request of the police, the girlfriend agreed to place a call to Cyr about the “Avon incident.” As police monitored her call, she told Cyr that detectives were asking her about the incident and took her cell phone, reminding him of the “text messages” and “phone calls” between them.
He asked her if she deleted them and indicated he planned on lying if questioned, according to the records. When she tried to dissuade him from lying, he responded, “do you know what can happen?...if they say I knew this I will go to jail for a very long time.” He told her police would need to prove it and that “you don’t know anything, so don’t say anything,” the court records state.
Police seized two semi-automatic handguns from Cyr’s home that matched the weapons description victims gave police. At least one of the guns is registered to Cyr, police said.
Cyr is charged with home invasion and first-degree robbery, as well as conspiracy to commit those crimes. He is currently locked up on a $750,000 bond.
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