An armed robbery suspect arrested by Sandy Springs police was charged in 2018 in a child sexual assault case and a separate a theft investigation.
Police arrested Zacchaeus Tillman, 23, of Atlanta, and Tarris Young, 33, of Union City, Wednesday, after an armed robbery at a T-Mobile store located in The Prado shopping center.
The 911 call for the alleged robbery came in Wednesday at 11:39 a.m., Sandy Springs police Sgt. SalOrtega said.
Ortega said the men entered the cellphone store with rifles and handguns and zip-tied four employees. The men allegedly fled with numerous stolen cellphones and took car keys from one of the tied-up employees. That person’s car was left running in the parking lot.
In 2018, Tillman was charged with child molestation, statutory rape and aggravated child molestation charges in a sexual assault case that started two years earlier. Arrests warrants showed a 15-year-old girl's mother found Tillman, age 19 at the time, in her home with her daughter in 2016, The Atlanta Journal Constitution reported.
The day Tillman was charged in that case, he was arrested for theft at a Georgia State University bookstore while he was employed there as supervisor. He admitted to stealing $40,000 in merchandise.
GSU police Chief Joseph Spillane told Channel 2 Action News, that day, that Tillman’s theft was part of a $400,000 scam that involved returning stolen merchandise to receive gift cards as refunds.
A short while after Wednesday’s alleged robbery at T-Mobile, Sandy Springs police spotted Tillman and Young in a car near Heards Ferry Road and Mount Vernon Highway. The men crashed into a vehicle at that location and then sideswiped another car, Ortega said.
The suspects’ Ford Fusion became disabled. The suspects jumped out of their vehicle and ran in two different directions through a residential neighborhood. One was arrested within five minutes. The second suspect was captured about 40 minutes later, Ortega said.
Tillman and Young received multiple charges including armed robbery, aggravated assault, false imprisonment, possession of a firearm in the commission of a felony, reckless driving and possession of cocaine.
“Although this was a traumatic incident for the T-Mobile employees, none of them were physically injured as a result of this robbery,” Ortega said. “The occupants of the two vehicles that were struck by the getaway vehicle were not seriously injured. All the stolen property was recovered as well as the two firearms used in the robbery.”
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