LR serial robber pleads guilty, receives 15-year prison sentence

A 53-year-old serial strongarm robber from Little Rock is on his way to a state penitentiary on a 15-year sentence after bringing his robbery total to seven, including one bank holdup.

Sentencing papers filed last week show Reginald Lamont Tayborn pleaded guilty to two counts of robbery — a 2023 store robbery and a 2021 carjacking, both in Little Rock — in exchange for the 15-year sentence imposed by Pulaski County Circuit Judge Karen Whatley as part of a plea agreement negotiated by deputy prosecutor Molly Hines and public defender Joe Don Winningham.

Tayborn has been jailed since his March 26 arrest following the holdup of the Dollar Tree, 1100 E. Roosevelt Road, in Little Rock in which he stole $101 from the cash register.

According to arrest reports, Tayborn pushed store clerk Marty Brooks, 24, to get to the cash register, then threatened to shoot her if she resisted, although he never displayed a weapon. Police pulled over the car Tayborn was riding in and arrested him eight minutes later. He’s been jailed ever since.

Tayborn had only been out of federal prison for an attempted bank-robbery conviction about a month when he robbed the store.

Tayborn had been arrested on the bank charges in January 2012 after North Little Rock police got a tip that he had a gun and was planning on robbing a bank there. The bank is not named in court records.

In that case, police put Tayborn under surveillance then stopped the car he was a passenger in for a traffic infraction. Tayborn gave police a fake name, with officers finding a revolver, ski mask and gloves at his feet.

He subsequently pleaded guilty to the attempted bank-robbery charge and was sentenced to 153 months, almost 13 years, in federal prison to be followed by three years of supervised release.

Released from federal prison in February 2021, he was

arrested by Arkansas State Police about two months later for robbing a woman.

Victim Cynthia Nichols called police in April 2021 to report that she’d been carjacked on Interstate 30 near Roosevelt Road.

Responding troopers found Nichols, then 59, bleeding from her mouth, with more blood on her face and mouth.

Nichols, who requires a walker for mobility, told investigators she’d been at the Parris Towers, 1800 Broadway St., in Little Rock to visit a friend when her attacker offered to pay her $20 for a ride.

She said the robber acted nice and she trusted him until they reached the area of Roosevelt Road, where he grabbed the steering wheel, started punching her in the face and forced her to pull over. He forced her out of the 2007 white Toyota Corolla and drove off.

Investigators learned the Corolla was seen later that night, first in North Little Rock and then in Little Rock, where it led police on a chase that ended after the driver crashed into another car and escaped on foot.

Inside the crashed Corolla, troopers found Tayborn’s application for public housing in North Little Rock. Surveillance video from the Parris Tower showed Tayborn getting into Nichols’ car, court records show. He was arrested five days later.

In August 2021, Tayborn was sentenced to two years in federal prison for violating the conditions of his attempted-robbery release by carjacking Nichols.

With the carjacking charge still pending, Tayborn was released from federal prison in February 2023, robbing the Little Rock Dollar Tree a month later.

Court records show that Tayborn has been under probation or parole for almost 28 years, beginning when he pleaded no contest in June 1996 to his first felony charge, terroristic threatening, for reaching through a car window and grabbing a woman, Jennifer Hall, by the neck, choking her while threatening to kill her in an October 1995 incident in Little Rock.

About 17 months later, Tayborn robbed the now-defunct Mercantile Bank in Park Plaza Mall in Little Rock in November 1997, about two weeks before Thanksgiving. Police said Tayborn showed up in a cab.

He had the driver wait outside while he went into the bank and told bank staff he had a gun and would use it if they didn’t give him money. He left in the same cab with cash. Some of the money was later found in the 4300 block of West 10th Street with surveillance video showing Tayborn to be the robber. He surrendered to authorities two days after the holdup.

Tayborn subsequently pleaded guilty to a federal bank robbery charge and received the minimum sentence in October 1998, 63 months in prison, a little more than five years, with an order to reimburse the bank $1,477.

In July 2001, prosecutors got his prison term reduced to one year, qualifying Tayborn for immediate release, although requiring that he serve three years of supervised release. The next day, Tayborn robbed cab driver Keith Smith on Higgins Switch Road.

Smith had picked Tayborn up on College Street in Little Rock and driven him to a residence in the Sweet Home community.

Tayborn said he didn’t have the money for the fare, telling Smith he’d run inside and get it. Instead, Tayborn came out of the house holding something wrapped in a blue shirt, which he put against Smith’s head and forced him to turn over his money, $63.

Tayborn would not be arrested for another month until after he had robbed two more people.

His next would be in August 2001 when Tayborn got Billy Williams to pick him up on Higgins Switch Road to give Tayborn a ride to Red Oak. Tayborn then asked Williams to take him to Little Rock and when Williams declined, Tayborn began beating on him, with Williams escaping through his pickup window, and Tayborn stealing the truck.

He was arrested by sheriff’s deputies that same day after attacking another cab driver on Higgins Switch. He and another man had taken a cab to that area, with Tayborn robbing driver Nicole Pool after the other passenger was dropped off.

Tayborn had asked Pool for change of $20, and when she got her purse out, Tayborn grabbed her arm then her throat, while threatening to shoot her if she didn’t give up her money, $62.

He spent about a month in jail before being released on bail in September 2001. Federal authorities took him into custody in November 2001 and Tayborn received a year in federal prison later that month for violating the conditions of his release on the bank robbery conviction.

Records don’t show when Tayborn was released. In November 2002, sheriff’s deputies would arrest Tayborn for his fourth robbery. In that case, Tayborn twisted Flash Market clerk Kali Copeland’s arm to make her give up two cartons of Newport cigarettes. He led deputies on a car chase and eluded them by hiding in some woods after crashing his car. He surrendered five hours later.

Tayborn pleaded guilty to his four robberies in February 2003 in Pulaski County Circuit Court in exchange for a 20-year state prison sentence.