Anthony Robinson was given the monikers the Shopping Cart Killer and Dating App Killer after his 2021 crime spree

Monica White; Anthony Robinson.Credit: Cheriss May; Harrisonburg Police Department via AP
Monica White; Anthony Robinson.
Credit: Cheriss May; Harrisonburg Police Department via AP

NEED TO KNOW

  • Anthony Robinson, known as the Dating App Killer, was convicted of murdering two women and is suspected in connection with four other deaths
  • Police linked Robinson to the murders through surveillance footage and his pattern of leaving shopping carts near victims’ bodies
  • Robinson, whose crimes were dramatized in the Lifetime movie The Dating App Killer: The Monica White Story, is serving two life sentences in Virginia

Anthony Robinson was convicted of killing at least two women but is suspected of killing at least six.

Robinson, who was given the nicknames the Dating App Killer and the Shopping Cart Killer, because of how he met his victims and how he transported their bodies after killing them, has been named the primary suspect in four women’s deaths and found guilty of two women’s murders.

In November 2021, police discovered the remains of two women — 54-year-old Allene “Beth” Redmon and 39-year-old Tonita Smith — in a field next to a motel in Harrisonburg, Va. In addition to their two bodies being close together, there was also a shopping cart placed near them.

The following month, two additional women — 29-year-old Cheyenne Brown and 48-year-old Stephanie Harrison — were found in a vacant lot near the Moon Inn Hotel in Alexandria, Va., about 130 miles from Harrisonburg. Similar to the other victims, they were found near a shopping cart.

Shortly after finding the first pair of bodies, police suspected Robinson, whom they described as a transient, after finding surveillance footage of Robinson with Redmon and him with a shopping cart. Other footage showed Robinson engaging in a similar pattern with Smith.

“He’s killed four victims already,” Fairfax County police chief Kevin Davis said at a press conference in December 2021. “We suspect that he has more.”

Upon his arrest, Robinson was also investigated for the deaths of his fiancée Skye Allen, as well as 40-year-old Sonya Champ, whose body was found in a shopping cart in a similar area in September 2021. Before Robinson committed the murders, he was in a brief relationship with Monica White. She broke up with him ahead of his 2021 arrest and her story has been dramatized for the Lifetime movie, The Dating App Killer: The Monica White Story, which hit Netflix on Aug. 15.

Here’s everything to know about where Anthony Robinson, the Dating App Killer and the Shopping Cart Killer, is now.

Who is Anthony Robinson?

Harrisonburg, Va., Police Chief Kelley Warner discussing murder charges against Anthony Robinson.Credit: Matthew Barakat/AP Photo
Harrisonburg, Va., Police Chief Kelley Warner discussing murder charges against Anthony Robinson.
Credit: Matthew Barakat/AP Photo

Robinson was a factory and waste-removal worker who authorities described as a “transient,” PEOPLE previously reported. Police shared that he was staying at at least one of the motels his victims were found near while working at a poultry-processing plant.

Investigators also revealed that he had previously lived in New York City, Maryland and Washington, D.C. After his arrest, authorities noted that he had a “remarkable absence of a criminal history.”

“That transient nature has prompted us to figure out where he’s been for the last several years,” Chief Davis said in a press conference in December 2021.

Who were Robinson’s victims?

Top row, from left: Tonita Smith, Stephanie Harrison, Cheyenne Brown; bottom row: Sonya Champ, Allene Redmon, Skye AllenCredit: Courtesy Smith Family; Courtesy Destiny Livingston; Courtesy Nicadra Brown; Facebook; Harrisburg Police Department; Facebook
Top row, from left: Tonita Smith, Stephanie Harrison, Cheyenne Brown; bottom row: Sonya Champ, Allene Redmon, Skye Allen
Credit: Courtesy Smith Family; Courtesy Destiny Livingston; Courtesy Nicadra Brown; Facebook; Harrisburg Police Department; Facebook

Authorities have named Robinson as a suspect in at least six homicides in Virginia, Maryland and the Washington, D.C., area. Police connected him to the murders through his two calling cards: meeting his victims on dating apps and leaving a shopping cart near their bodies.

The first woman to be reported missing was 29-year-old Brown, who was a mother of a young son and pregnant with her second child. She was last seen at a Metro station near her home in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 30, 2021. She had a close relationship with her mother, Nicadra Brown, who pleaded with the public to help find her daughter.

Prior to Brown’s disappearance, she met Robinson online in August 2021 and invited him to their family home, which ended in Robinson getting kicked out for inappropriate behavior. Even before her daughter’s body was found in December, Nicadra contacted police and alerted them to her suspicions about Robinson.

Brown’s remains were found on Dec. 15, 2021, in a vacant lot near the Moon Inn Hotel in Alexandria, Va. Police later uncovered surveillance footage of Robinson and Brown at the same metro station and learned that she was staying at the hotel at the same time as Robinson.

When police found Brown’s body, they also located 48-year-old Stephanie Harrison, a woman from Redding, Calif., who was staying at the Moon Inn Hotel at the same time as Robinson. There was a shopping cart next to both of their bodies.

One month before Brown and Harrison’s bodies were located, police found the bodies of his known third and fourth victims. On Oct. 24, 2021, mother of two 54-year-old Allene “Beth” Redmon was reported missing after she didn’t show up for work. Prior to her disappearance, she told her family that she was going to a football game with a friend.

On Nov. 19, 2021, Tonita Smith, 39, a mother of six from Charlottesville, Va., became the fourth woman to go missing in connection with Robinson. Smith’s brother, Dean, later told PEOPLE that he believed Smith met Robinson on a dating app.

“We had just lost our mother, just lost two of our aunties, and my son has been missing since 2012, so we were dealing with a lot of sad situations,” Dean shared. “She was dealing with trauma and I guess just looking for love in the wrong place, and somebody took advantage of her.”

Both Redmon and Smith were later seen on surveillance footage walking with Robinson in the Howard Johnson Hotel in Harrisonburg, Va., on two separate occasions. The women’s remains were located in a field next to the motel — with a nearby shopping cart — on Nov. 23, 2021.

After police apprehended Robinson, they further stated that they were investigating him in connection with the murder of 40-year-old Sonya Champ after her body was found in a shopping cart in Washington, D.C., in September 2021. Three years later, his DNA was found on Champ’s body, per WTOP News.

Authorities also looked into Robinson’s former fiancée Skye Allen’s death in 2018 at 30 years old. No charges have been made in connection with her death.

How was Robinson caught?

Shopping cart found in Fairfax CountyCredit: Fairfax County Police Department
Shopping cart found in Fairfax County
Credit: Fairfax County Police Department

Shortly after police found Redmon and Smith’s remains in Harrisonburg, they located surveillance footage of him with both women on two separate occasions. Redmon was seen walking into a motel room with Robinson in October 2021, and he was later seen leaving the same room with a shopping cart holding a large object wrapped in sheets.

Police uncovered surveillance footage of Robinson doing the same with Smith the following month. He was later arrested and charged with two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of concealing dead bodies and two counts of aggravated murder.

He was also named as the primary suspect in the deaths of Brown and Harrison but has not been charged. Davis said at the time that “Robinson was the last person to be seen alive with Cheyenne.”

“I will not rest until he pays for what he’s done to my daughter and these other women,” Nicadra told PEOPLE of her daughter’s alleged killer.

Police accused Robinson of meeting women on dating websites and luring them to motels and killing them.

“We have a serial killer,” Davis said during a December 2021 press conference. “He preys on the weak and the vulnerable,” and after doing “unspeakable things” to his victims, “he transports their bodies to their final resting place literally in a shopping cart.”

Where is Anthony Robinson now?

Anthony Robinson.Credit: Harrisonburg Police Department via AP
Anthony Robinson.
Credit: Harrisonburg Police Department via AP

Robinson’s murder trial for the deaths of Redmon and Smith began in January 2025. His defense team argued that the surveillance footage didn’t prove he was responsible for the deaths, while prosecutors said there were clear links between Robinson and the women.

“Anthony Robinson is a cold-blooded murderer, plain and simple,” Marsha Garst, Rockingham County Commonwealth’s Attorney, said during closing arguments, per WHSV. “He’s a hunter and a predator of women.”

It took the jury around 30 minutes to find Robinson guilty of killing Redmon and Smith, per WTOP News. He was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of concealing a body and two counts of aggravated murder.

In May 2026, Robinson was sentenced to two life sentences plus 10 years and approximately $205,000 in fines, according to Rocktown Now.

Robinson is serving his life sentences at Wallens Ridge State Prison in Big Stone Gap, Va., per inmate records.

Robinson’s crimes have since been dramatized in the 2026 Lifetime movie The Dating App Killer: The Monica White Story, in which Jarod Joseph plays him, and Lela Rochon portrays Monica White — Robinson’s ex-girlfriend who suspected he could be dangerous.

“I knew something was wrong with him,” White told PEOPLE in 2024. “Something snapped. It was crazy.”

She added, “Once I started putting the puzzle together, of course, when the pieces fit, they fit. I felt like I might’ve been the reason why he might have snapped. I had actually allowed this man into my home, allowed him to stay overnight in my home. Then to find out later on, you started killing people?”

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