It was a classic bank robbery. An innocuous-looking man in a baseball cap, a note slid to a teller, a hand, hinting at a gun, in a pocket.
The only difference was as the robber waited for the frightened tellers to hand him the money, he dropped his driver’s license and debit card on the floor and failed to notice.
Heath B. Clark robbed banks in Indiana, Missouri and Georgia during a two-week span in March 2015. One was a Woodforest National Bank inside a Walmart in Evansville, Indiana, where, according to court documents, he accidentally left behind the two pieces of identification.
Clark, 44, of Pleasant View, Tennessee, pleaded guilty to bank robbery and was sentenced to 100 months imprisonment in federal court Tuesday for the robberies.
In total, Clark came away with nearly $21,000 from the three banks he robbed, according to court documents. He will have to pay the banks back in full for what he stole.
His spree began on March 9 at a Fifth Third Bank inside a Kroger in Georgia. He walked in and passed a note to the teller that said, “You are being robbed. I have a gun.”
He threatened to shoot the woman if she failed to empty the drawer, raised an alarm or placed a GPS device in with the money . Although he never showed a gun, the teller said Clark had a “large bulge in the front of his waistband that he kept putting his hands near.” She later told investigators she thought he would probably shoot her. She gave him $11,515.
After Clark fled, police searched the premises and found a long-sleeved blue shirt in the parking lot that matched the description of the shirt Clark had worn. It was sent for DNA testing and came back as a match to Clark, according to court documents.
Clark repeated his act in Evansville, where he dropped his license and debit card and stole $830, and in a Bank of Bolivar in Springfield, Missouri, where he stole $8,610. A teller at the bank said Clark said something like “See you all later” as he left with the money. All three banks he robbed were insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
Through security footage and photo line-ups, a bank manager and teller from the Evansville bank were able to identify Clark for authorities, according to court documents. Authorities began tracing Clark’s cellphone and used it to find him March 24, 2015, at Gold Strike Casino in Robinsonville, Mississippi. When he was apprehended in the lobby, Clark had $39 worth of gambling chips, $118 worth of casino coupons and a little more than $2,000 in cash.
After Clark is released from prison, he will serve three years of supervised release.
