By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

An Alabaster woman will spend the next three years on probation after she pleaded guilty to charges stemming from the Jan. 6 robbery of an elderly woman in the parking lot of a Hoover Publix supermarket.

Shelby County District Court Judge Dan Reeves sentenced 33-year-old Stephanie Robasciotti Mills on April 3 after she pleaded guilty to two counts of fraudulent use of a credit or debit card, both Class C felonies. Through a plea agreement, four other counts of fraudulent use of a credit or debit card and one count of second-degree robbery against Mills were dropped.

Reeves originally sentenced Mills to two years in jail, but suspended the sentence to three years of supervised probation. While on probation, Mills also must submit to random drug and alcohol tests, and must successfully complete a substance abuse treatment program.

Mills also must pay $758 to the victim in the Jan. 6 robbery incident and avoid all contact with the victim.

Mountain Brook Police arrested Mills and 36-year-old Alabaster resident Christopher Joseph Stone on Jan. 10 after the Hoover Police Department issued information regarding a Jan. 6 robbery to area media and law enforcement agencies.

Mills and Stone were charged in connection with a Jan. 6 robbery in the parking lot of the Publix supermarket on Doug Baker Boulevard off U.S. 280. One of the suspects allegedly “reached out of the passenger window of the vehicle and snatched the purse” from an elderly woman’s shoulder.

“The victim was thrown to the ground as the suspect and driver fled the scene in a small, silver vehicle,” read a Hoover Police press release.

Mills allegedly used one of the victim’s stolen credit cards to make a purchase at the Pelham CVS about 30 minutes after the robbery, according to Hoover Police. The other fraudulent use of a credit or debit card charge Mills pleaded guilty to came after she used a credit card stolen from another victim on Dec. 29, according to court records.

As of April 30, Stone was still being held in the Shelby County Jail on bonds totaling $90,000, and was facing charges of first-degree theft of property and second-degree robbery.

If convicted, Stone could face between two and 20 years in prison for each of his charges.