NORRISTOWN >> An arrest warrant has been issued for a 20-year-old man accused of swindling a teenage boy out of $300 in a phony pot deal in Lansdale last spring after he failed to show up for a pre-trial hearing in county court, records show.
County and local law enforcement officers are now authorized to take Joshua Ryan Ronan – who is listed in county records as last residing at 37 E. Main St. in Lansdale – into custody after a bench warrant was issued on Wednesday, the day after he skipped his scheduled hearing.
Ronan had been free on $5,000 unsecured bail, which is now forfeited, meaning he may have a cash bail set by a judge upon his capture by authorities.
Ronan faces a first-degree misdemeanor theft charge for the purported cannabis chicanery.
According to borough police, on the afternoon of May 30, 2014, officers responded to the Rite Aid at 10 West Main Street for a reported robbery and spoke with the 15-year-old victim, who said that a white male, later identified as Ronan, took off with $300 he had given him.
The boy said that he had called a phone number with the intention of buying marijuana and spoke with Ronan – the pair then arranged to meet in Lansdale and walk to the Rite Aid to do the deal, detectives said.
Inside the Rite Aid, the boy gave Ronan the cash and Ronan indicated that the marijuana was in the store bathroom, police said. The boy went in, didn’t find any weed, and when he came out of the bathroom, Ronan had already fled with his money.
About a week later, detectives said, they received a tip implicating Ronan in the theft. Further investigation traced the phone number the boy had called to a 17-year-old girl who told detectives she had lent the phone to Ronan and overheard him talking to someone about meeting up the day of the alleged incident, police said.
In mid-June, police said, the boy was shown a photo of Ronan, who he identified as the person who ripped him off.
Lansdale Sgt. Alex Kromdyk said that Ronan, who authorities believed had been living on the street at the time of the alleged theft, had disappeared by that point, and as detectives were working to track him down, the department learned from Cape May County police that Ronan was in custody there as of early July on drug-related charges.
New Jersey court records indicate Ronan, who was behind bars for 198 days in lieu of $25,000 bail while that case was active, eventually pleaded guilty to a heroin possession charge and was sentenced Jan. 16 to four years of probation plus community service.
Once that sentence was handed down, Ronan was handed over to Lansdale police for arraignment on two counts of first-degree misdemeanor theft and one count of first-degree misdemeanor receiving stolen property.
In February, Ronan appeared before Lansdale District Judge Harold Borek for a preliminary hearing in the matter – prosecutors withdrew the receiving stolen property charge and one of the theft charges, and Borek held for trial the other theft charge.
Ronan waived his formal arraignment in county court, which was scheduled for April 1, records indicate.
Court records show Ronan was cited for public drunkenness by Lansdale police on April 22.
