CLARKS SUMMIT -- 21-year-old Daniel Singer was named a suspect in a troubling robbery case. Singer was accused of following an 89-year-old woman and robbing her in front of her home in Clarks Summit.
Police then went looking for Singer, they had a warrant for his arrest. Prosecutors suspect Singer may have been looking for drug money.
"Quite often the majority of our crimes are fueled by either addiction or mental health issues. So, I think if you look at the allegations of that robbery on the face I think it would be fair to say that addiction played a role in that if Daniel was involved," said Lackawanna County District Attorney Shane Scanlon.
According to Scanlon, officers even searched his family's garage in Scott Township and knocked on the front door but there was no answer.
Hours later, a family member found both Singer and his mother, Bonni Shelp, 58, dead.
Their causes of death have not been officially determined but the DA says both mother and son had an addiction to heroin.
Evidence, he says, of the widespread heroin epidemic in our area. "And here we have a 58-year-old professional attorney and a 21-year-old man each who battled with addiction for quite a while."
Governor Tom Wolf who was in Scranton Friday said he has plans to address the state legislature next week to find more funding to fight heroin addiction.
"We're doing a lot of things to address this scourge, but we can do more. And I think everybody or every side of the partisan divide gets this in Harrisburg. We will see next week, I'm sure that the people of Pennsylvania will be pleased with what we are doing, because we cannot live life with the kind of thing that you just described," commented Governor Wolf
