A man who has been charged with a violent attack in a Delaware store is now being investigated for a possible connection to three murders, including that of a North Philadelphia Dunkin’ store manager and a Delaware Metro by T-Mobile store employee, law enforcement sources said. NBC10’s Danny Freeman has the details.
A man who has been charged with a violent attack in a Delaware store is now being investigated for a possible connection to three murders, including that of a North Philadelphia Dunkin’ store manager and a Delaware Metro by T-Mobile store employee, law enforcement sources said.
Keith Gibson was arrested in Wilmington Tuesday morning after he allegedly pistol-whipped a clerk at a Delaware Rite Aid.
Multiple law enforcement sources told NBC10 Gibson is also being investigated for a possible connection to three murders, including that of his own mother.
He has not been charged with murder.
Get top local stories in Philly delivered to you every morning. Sign up for NBC Philadelphia's News Headlines newsletter.
The most recent murder being investigated occurred over the weekend. Early Saturday morning, Christine Lugo, 40, was shot and killed by an armed robber as she was opening the Dunkin’ store on the 500 block of W. Lehigh Avenue in Philadelphia's Fairhill neighborhood.
Surveillance video shows a man standing outside near the door before forcibly grabbing Lugo and pushing her inside the store as he brandished a handgun. The video further shows him forcing her into the kitchen, then a storage room, where he makes her give him cash.
Police said that after Lugo gave him the money, the man shot her once in the head and fled. Lugo was declared dead at the scene.
Police released surveillance photos of the suspect. Law enforcement sources told NBC10 the man’s description matched a suspect in a similar crime in May in which a woman working at a Metro by T-Mobile store in Elsmere, New Castle County, Delaware, was killed by an armed robber who also stole her car.
Local
Breaking news and the stories that matter to your neighborhood.
The victim in the Delaware shooting was identified as Leslie Ruiz Basilio. Basilio's mother, Celia Basilio, told Telemundo 62 that if the man in custody was the person who killed her daughter, she's happy he can't hurt anyone anymore.
"He doesn't deserve to be a free man," she said.
Law enforcement sources told NBC10 Gibson is also being investigated for a possible connection to the murder of his mother in February.
Gibson has a decade-long criminal history in Delaware, according to the state's Attorney General's Office. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison in 2010 for manslaughter, with his sentence suspended to eight years. Dating back to 2000, he was also convicted of a weapon charge, forgery, assault and multiple drug dealing counts.
When Gibson was arrested Tuesday morning following the attack at Rite Aid, he was wearing a bullet proof vest and in possession of a gun, ammunition, a knife and drugs, police said.
Gibson was held on more than $300,000 bail. Federal agents, Wilmington police and Philadelphia police continue to investigate.
