Suspect arrested in parking garage attack

A man accused of robbing a woman at knifepoint in a downtown parking garage is in custody following a raid Tuesday evening by members of the Billings Police SWAT team at a South Side residence.

At a press conference this morning, Chief Rich St. John announced that 44-year-old Richard Edward Covington was identified by DNA evidence as a suspect in the April 10 robbery at the Northern Hotel parking garage.

Covington is being held in the county jail on a possible charge of felony robbery and is expected to make a first court appearance today. An arrest warrant issued Tuesday set Covington's bond at $250,000.

St. John said the SWAT team was deployed to arrest Covington because he has a felony criminal record and is known to local enforcement as having a "propensity for violence." St. John said no one was injured during the arrest about 5 p.m. at 223 S. 28th St., including Covington's wife and a 12-year-old boy who were also in the residence.

Neighbors watched as police surrounded the house and entered after throwing concussion grenades inside. St. John said he did not know whether an attempt to contact Covington was made before the SWAT team took action. He described the operation as a "high risk arrest." No firearms were found in the residence, he said.

"I think that his background and history was such that we anticipated violence or resistance," the police chief said. "We did not want to under-react."

The arrest took place next door to where the bodies of a couple were found in a smoldering apartment last September. Two weeks later, the body of man who lived in an adjacent apartment was found off Blue Creek Road. Police have said the murders are connected.

St. John said investigators have not tied Covington to the unsolved murders. A search of Covington's residence Tuesday turned up evidence of possible stolen property, St. John said, but nothing that directly links him to the slayings.

The parking garage robbery happened about 2:30 p.m. as a 46-year-old woman was walking to her car. The woman said a man confronted her with a knife and tried to take her purse. When the woman resisted, she was cut on the abdomen before the man fled.

The woman was treated overnight at St. Vincent Healthcare.

St. John said evidence from the crime scene such as clothing yielded DNA evidence that led investigators to Covington. According to state prison records, Covington was convicted of robbery in Yellowstone County in 1982. He has a subsequent felony theft conviction in Texas in 1984. Covington also has domestic violence and numerous traffic violations on his record, St. John said.