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Two men suspected of robbing the Leesburg branch of National City Bank last week were taken into custody Saturday in Elkhart County.
Criss Duncan, 43, of Shipshewana, and Ralph Berkey Jr., 34, Elkhart, are being held without bond in the Kosciusko County Jail. Each is preliminarily charged with armed robbery. Local authorities will pursue the case as a local matter, but said it likely will be upgraded to federal charges.
"We got a couple of bad people off the street," Kosciusko County Sheriff Aaron Rovenstine said today. "They both had arsenals ... it's unknown what they planned to do or what they've done." It was confirmed that both men have criminal records, but "nothing of this magnitude," according to Detective Sgt. J.D. Ayres of the KCSD.
Among the evidence confiscated as a result of search warrants executed at the suspects' homes is a gun safe that was booby trapped with a live hand grenade. Rovenstine said a bomb squad removed the safe, which has not yet been opened, from Berkey's home and the grenade was detonated.
Police also recovered various weapons and homemade and purchased bullet-proof vests, including one with a fragment of a bullet casing in it.
Duncan and Berkey are suspected of entering the National City Bank on South Main Street in Leesburg at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday while allegedly armed with military-style rifles. The two reportedly fled the bank with an undisclosed amount of cash and were seen driving away from the bank in a red or maroon van.
Rovenstine said police were able to obtain the vehicle identification number of the van, which later was found burned in a wooded area along CR 800N, near CR 150W. That led police to a LaGrange County residence, where a former owner of the van eventually revealed the name of a man to whom the van recently was sold. That name matched one of the suspects, police said.
Shortly after the alleged robbers fled from the bank, they switched from driving the van to a red pickup. That vehicle was spotted by Milford town marshal Dave Hobbs, who approached the pickup on foot to question the driver as to whether he had seen the van that police were looking for. Hobbs then saw that a passenger was squatting down on the floor of the pickup and he allegedly was holding a rifle pointed at Hobbs.
Hobbs and the suspects reportedly exchanged fire, with Hobbs' patrol car being damaged by bullets. Officials said it is not known whether the bullet-damage vest that was found partially burned behind one of the suspect's homes was damaged from being tested or was struck during the exchange of gunfire with Hobbs.
Rovenstine said Hobbs was one of the keys to solving this robbery because he was able to provide information about the change of vehicle and detailed descriptions of the suspects.
"The FBI also gave us a lot of resources," Rovenstine said.
The bullet-riddled pickup was located Friday night in Cass County, Mich., where a resident discovered it in a wooded area near her home.
Duncan and Berkey were taken into custody late Saturday at Berkey's house. Rovenstine said the Elkhart County SWAT team was set to enter Duncan's house with a search warrant when officials conducting surveillance at Berkey's LaGrange County residence observed the two men enter that home.
The two were taken into custody without incident during a traffic stop as they left Berkey's home. Police reported finding a large quantity of money, believed taken during the Leesburg robbery, in the vehicle the men were in when they were arrested. Although the amount of money taken was not revealed, Detective Sgt. J.D. Ayres of the KCSD said a "substantial amount" of what is believed taken from the Leesburg bank was recovered.
The search warrant was executed at Duncan's house, where a lot of weapons were seized, Rovenstine said.
A woman believed to be Duncan's girlfriend, Robin Cassity, 39, was booked into the LaGrange County Jail on charges of possession of stolen property, possession of methamphetamine, possession of marijuana and possession of a controlled substance. LaGrange County Sheriff Greg Dhaene said it is not yet known whether Cassity will be tied to and/or charged in connection with the robbery.
Rovenstine said the investigation required the cooperation of many law enforcement agencies and involved "good, hard police work" on the part of the Kosciusko County Sheriff's Department detectives, who worked around the clock to solve the robbery. "They (the detectives) deserve a lot of credit," Rovenstine said.
The KCSD, LaGrange and Elkhart counties sheriff's departments, Indiana State Police, Cass County (Mich.) Sheriff's Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation were among the investigating agencies.
