A man was charged with committing two carjackings in Bucks County, including one in Bristol Borough that left an 83-year-old woman hospitalized. In each of the carjackings, Kevin O’Connell, with no fixed address, threatened to inject the victims with a syringe.
O’Connell was arrested in Philadelphia less than 24 hours after the Bristol carjacking and is being held there on receiving stolen property charges.
In Bucks County, O’Connell faces two counts each of robbery of a motor vehicle, robbery, theft by unlawful taking, receiving stolen property, terroristic threats and simple assault. He is also facing charges of aggravated assault, simple assault and recklessly endangering another person for the carjacking.
“This man’s arrest for two violent carjackings are as a result of great police work by Bristol Borough PD and including cooperation from Philadelphia PD, in combination with modern DNA technology,” said District Attorney Matt Weintraub. “Carjacking is still comparatively rare in Bucks County and that’s as a consequence of joint law enforcement efforts like these. We will now focus our prosecution on deterring this man and others from committing these violent acts in the future.”
On Friday, Aug. 19, at 10:05 a.m., Bristol Borough Police were dispatched to 200 Commerce Circle for a report of a car theft in progress. Upon arrival, police officers were flagged down by several people in the parking lot and witnesses told them a white male had robbed an elderly female of her 2007 Toyota Camry. The victim was inside a medical clinic slumped down in a chair. Police observed she was bleeding from her arm and leg, and she was taken by ambulance to the hospital to be treated.
At the hospital, police spoke to the victim. She said she was walking back to her car following an appointment at the medical clinic when a male came up to her window and asked for a dollar to get a drink. After she refused, the man opened her car door and got inside, telling her that “he has AIDS,” and was going to give her a shot, according to a criminal complaint.
She again refused to give him money and the male grabbed her keys. The woman started beeping her horn, and the male backed away and placed her keys on the ground. When she got out of the car to retrieve the keys, the male grabbed them off the ground, jumped into her car and drove away, knocking her to the ground. She suffered lacerations to her right leg and right arm and bruising to her right leg.
The next morning, Bristol Borough Police received a call from Philadelphia Police, who informed them that they located and stopped the victim’s vehicle. Two people were inside the vehicle, including O’Connell, who was driving. Police spoke to the victim a second time and she was able to identify O’Connell as the male who robbed her.
The investigation linked O’Connell to an earlier carjacking. On March 16, at 9:23 a.m., Bristol Township Police were dispatched to the McDonald’s at 7700 Bristol Pike. Police spoke to a woman who said she had just parked her 2019 Chevrolet Trax when a male approached the passenger side and entered. The male told her, “I’m a heroin addict and I have a needle, get out of the car,” according to the criminal complaint.
The woman fled out of her vehicle for fear of her safety, taking her keys with her. However, the male was still able to start the vehicle because of its keyless ignition and fled. The vehicle was tracked to Philadelphia. Once the vehicle was recovered, Bristol Township Police took multiple DNA swabs, which returned a match for O’Connell.
An arrest warrant was then filed on Aug. 25, charging O’Connell in a May 27 burglary in Tullytown Borough. A police investigation found that O’Connell entered the garage of a home on Stonybrook Drive in the early hours that morning and stole $5,000 in tools and household items. He faces felony counts of burglary, criminal trespassing, theft and receiving stolen property, and a misdemeanor of loitering or prowling at night.
This case is assigned for prosecution to Assistant District Attorney Edward Furman Jr.
