A Monroe woman who prosecutors say was the getaway driver in a string of area robberies was offered a plea deal Tuesday that could see her spend the next six years in prison.
Patricia Mercaldi, 30, charged by Shelton police in December with conspiracy to commit first-degree robbery, appeared July 9 before Judge Frank Iannotti at Superior Court in Milford.
Background
Mercaldi was arrested by Shelton police at Superior Court in Derby last December in connection with a gun-point stick-up of the Shell Station at 99 Bridgeport Ave.
By that point she and the man accused of perpetrating the stick-ups, Kashawn Brown, 24, were behind bars after being charged in similar cases in Bridgeport.
The Shelton robbery occurred Oct. 6, when police said an employee at the gas station said that a man wearing a hooded sweatshirt and a black cloth covering his face entered the store, displayed a gun and demanded money before fleeing with an undetermined amount of cash.
The employee was not injured and no one else was in the store at the time. Police believe Mercaldi acted as the getaway driver during the heist for Brown.
Brown is due at Superior Court in Milford July 31. He has pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree robbery, conspiracy to commit first-degree robbery, and fifth-degree larceny in the Shelton case, and has been behind bars since November, when he was initially arrested by Bridgeport police.
Click here to read more about the Bridgeport cases in a CT Post story.
‘Inclined’ To Take Deal
Mercaldi’s lawyer, John Drapp, said in court July 9 that prosecutors have offered Mercaldi a six-year prison sentence in the case that “she’s inclined to accept.”
But she didn’t want to take the deal Tuesday, Drapp said, because she faces a laundry list of charges in connection with eight Bridgeport robberies and another in Trumbull and wants to see how those cases shake out first.
“We believe we’ll have a better idea of what the situation in Bridgeport will be by the end of this month,” Drapp told the judge.
Judge Iannotti was baffled as to why Mercaldi wanted the delay, saying nothing in Bridgeport would change what happens with the Shelton case, but granted the request anyway, scheduling her return to court for Aug. 30.
At that point Mercaldi will accept or reject the deal offered by prosecutors, which calls for her to receive a 15-year prison sentence, to be suspended after she serves six years, followed by five years of probation.
In the Bridgeport and Trumbull cases, Drapp said Mercaldi has received an offer from prosecutors at Superior Court in Bridgeport calling for a 20-year prison sentence to be served after Mercaldi serves six years.
The two sentences would run concurrently, meaning Mercaldi would serve a total of six years.
