Lynchburg man gets 20 years in robbery

A Lynchburg man was sentenced to 20 years in prison Friday morning for his role in a 2008 robbery.

According to the prosecutor, and victim testimony, Spencer Mosley forced a woman to strip during the robbery, then hit her in the face with the butt of a shotgun before threatening to shoot her.

“She believed he was going to kill her,” Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Bethany Harrison told the court Friday.

Mosley, 30, pleaded guilty in May to two counts of robbery, two counts of use of a firearm in commission of a felony and one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Lynchburg Circuit Court Judge Mosby Perrow sentenced him to serve 20 years in prison with an additional 10 years suspended.

In a summary of evidence presented to the court at the May hearing, Harrison said Mosley told police he was driving around the city on July 19 around 3 a.m. when the victims approached the vehicle he was in looking to buy $150 worth of crack cocaine.

Harrison said Mosley told the victims to drive around the block. When they arrived near the intersection of 17th Street and Spencer Place, she said, Mosley told police that his codefendants, 22-year-old Joel Cunningham and 18-year-old Ramone Calloway, jumped out of their vehicle wielding shotguns.

Two male victims were then robbed of $75 and $2, respectively, she said.

When the third victim denied having any money, she was ordered to strip, the prosecutor said.

“Some money fell out of her bra,” Harrison wrote in her summary of evidence. “The defendant then took one of the guns and hit her in the left eye and cheek bone with the butt of the gun.”

In exchange for his pleas in May, charges of the attempted robbery of the woman and use of a firearm in the attempted robbery of the woman were dropped.

Defense attorney Scott De Bruin argued for a lesser sentence, saying that while his client had previous felony convictions, this was his first conviction for a violent felony.

Mosley also told the court he wasn’t driving around the city that night with the intention of committing random robberies.

After being taken back to the courthouse holding cells, Mosley was heard in the courtroom wailing and banging on the walls.