Armored Car

Robbers held up an armored-car courier outside a Roxborough bank yesterday and escaped with $105,000 in cash - despite accidentally locking the keys inside one of their getaway cars. The robbery occurred at 12:55 p.m. in front of a CoreStates First Pennsylvania Bank branch in the 7100 block of Ridge Avenue. Alfred Gaskin, 43, a courier for Brink's Inc., was wheeling a large bag of cash from an armored car when he was confronted by two men, one of them brandishing a double- barreled shotgun, according to police sources.

In a surprise development yesterday, one of two men accused of stealing a sack containing more than $350,000 from an armored car in 1987 agreed to plead guilty and testify against his co-defendant and friend, Joseph "Thin Joey" Merlino. On the second day of his trial, Richard Barone, 45, pleaded guilty to theft and conspiracy. U.S. District Judge Norma L. Shapiro sent the jury home and declared a mistrial for Merlino, 24, who is the son of one convicted mobster, Salvatore "Chuckie" Merlino, and the nephew of another, Lawrence "Yogi" Merlino.

When the Clover store's security people spotted the two men loitering in the girls' department, they thought they had shoplifters and started their surveillance cameras rolling. But what the cameras captured yesterday afternoon in Northeast Philadelphia was no two-bit shoplifting. Instead, police said, they recorded a full-blown heist in which an armored- car guard was shot at and robbed of $40,000 in cash and checks by two bandits who escaped in a taxi. No one was injured, police said, but the stickup was the latest of two dozen armored-car robberies in the region since last year.

A man standing trial on charges that he conspired to steal $352,000 out of an armored car in 1987 told police this week that someone had fired a bullet into his apartment, federal and local sources said. Richard Barone, 45, of the 2600 block of Brown Street in the Fairmount section, told police that the bullet came through a screen window early Monday and struck the sofa on which he was resting, sources said. Barone is on trial in U.S. District Court on charges that he conspired with Joseph Merlino, 24, son of convicted organized-crime figure Salvatore Merlino, and an armored-car driver to make it appear as though money had fallen from the truck.

The driver of an armored car was wounded in the leg yesterday by one of two men who robbed a CoreStates-First Pennsylvania Bank branch in Cheltenham Township of an undisclosed amount of cash, police said. Larry West, 58, a veteran employee of the Brink's Inc. armored car service, was shot as he ran after the gunmen outside the branch at 341 W. Cheltenham Ave. West was reported in fair condition yesterday afternoon at Rolling Hill Hospital in Cheltenham with a wound below the knee.

The lone survivor of the three-man armored-car crew fired on by a robber in Northeast Philadelphia testified yesterday that the darkly clad gunman had shot without warning. As Loomis driver Joseph Walczak waited for his coworkers to service a Wachovia ATM at the Roosevelt Mall on Oct. 4, he was jolted when a bullet struck a window in the armored car, Walczak said during yesterday's preliminary hearing in Municipal Court for accused murderer Mustafa Ali. "I was on my way down when I seen the black figure shooting.

A Philadelphia police officer interviews a Brinks guard in his armored car yesterday in West Oak Lane after two men took $40,000 cash from him while he was making a delivery to Discount Check Cashing on Stenton Avenue near Washington Lane. The men also took the guard's gun.

PITTSBURGH - Authorities said that an armored-car guard was found shot to death under a railroad trestle in Pittsburgh in an apparent robbery, and police are searching for another guard. Lt. Kevin Kraus said that officers found the Garda armored car in the city's Strip District at about 3:45 p.m. yesterday and found one of the guards dead in the cargo area with what appeared to be a single gunshot wound to the back of the head. He said that a second guard, a 22-year-old man, is being sought and is believed to be armed with two semiautomatic pistols.

A South Philadelphia man was arrested yesterday in the shooting and robbery of an armored car guard last Friday outside a check-cashing agency, police said. Reginald Stinnett, of Dickinson Street near 20th, was held in $70,000 bail for his alleged part in the wounding of Federal Armored Express guard Donald Campbell outside the Financial Exchange on Washington Avenue near 22nd Street. Stinnett, 34, was charged with simple and aggravated assault, robbery, conspiracy, reckless endangerment and weapons offenses.

Two men are in custody and police are looking for two to four more in a series of recent armored car stickups. Anthony McGoue, of Pine Street near 59th, West Philadelphia, and Thaddeus Garfield, of Markoe Street near Woodland Avenue, Southwest Philadelphia, are accused of robbery, weapons offenses and conspiracy, police said. The two men were arrested yesterday by FBI agents and members of the police Major Crimes Unit following an investigation of a half dozen robberies in the past three months.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - When the armored car set off for the Brussels airport carrying $50 million worth of precious stones from Antwerp's diamond district, eight gunmen knew all about it. One of the biggest diamond heists in recent memory was about to go down. The thieves surely knew it would be too risky to make their move in Antwerp, which is the world capital of diamond-cutting, 27 miles from the airport. The city's diamond industry has 2,000 surveillance cameras, police monitoring, and countless identity controls to protect its $200 million in daily trade of rough and polished gems.

Here are a couple of tidbits to include in Insurance Fraud for Dummies : If you're going to claim you were in a SEPTA bus accident, make sure you were on the bus when the accident happened. And surveillance cameras are everywhere. Including on SEPTA buses. Eight Philadelphians charged Thursday with insurance fraud could learn those lessons the hard way. The District Attorney's Office said the alleged fraud began with a December 2009 accident in Center City, when the mirror of a SEPTA bus clipped the mirror of an armored car at 15th and Walnut Streets.

  What's a tiny volunteer fire company in Bensalem doing with a $1 million taxpayer-funded fireboat tricked out to troll the Delaware River for blazes, bodies, terrorists, and IEDs? Nothing, besides preening for festival crowds and crashing into objects seen and unseen. The tale of how the dysfunctional Union Fire Company won a wad of Homeland Security money to buy a state-of-the-art terror-taming boat screams post-9/11 planning at its nuttiest. The volunteers' bold play to dabble in regional law enforcement has soured relations with Bensalem's paid police department.

PITTSBURGH - Authorities said that an armored-car guard was found shot to death under a railroad trestle in Pittsburgh in an apparent robbery, and police are searching for another guard. Lt. Kevin Kraus said that officers found the Garda armored car in the city's Strip District at about 3:45 p.m. yesterday and found one of the guards dead in the cargo area with what appeared to be a single gunshot wound to the back of the head. He said that a second guard, a 22-year-old man, is being sought and is believed to be armed with two semiautomatic pistols.

Gunplay on a North Philadelphia street critically wounded an armored-car guard who was shot in the head Thursday night while servicing an ATM in a neighborhood grocery, police said. But the shooting about 7:30 p.m. in the 3000 block of North Ninth Street, near Clearfield Street, initially reported as a robbery, was not a typical attempted heist, police said. Instead, it appears the guard, 29, whose name was not released, was the victim of an errant shot aimed by unidentified gunmen firing from outside the store at a 17-year-old male, police said.

A Chester County man died after he collided head-on with an armored vehicle Tuesday morning in West Goshen Township, police said. Robert Barnes Jr., 72, of West Grove, was traveling westbound on West Chester Pike at 9:13 a.m. when his 2011 Mitsubishi Galant "veered into oncoming traffic for unknown reasons," striking a Loomis armored vehicle, said a news release from West Goshen Township police. The crash occurred in the 1100 block of West Chester Pike, in front of the Golf Club Apartment complex, police said.

A Philadelphia man who held up an armored-car guard in 2009 and then shot at police during a gun battle was sentenced Friday to 30 years in prison. Brian Williams, 53, along with Anthony Reid, 45, robbed the guard as he delivered cash to ATMs at a West Philadelphia gas station. U.S. Attorney Zane David Memeger said Williams and Reid took the guard's gun and a bag of currency during the Sept. 4, 2009, robbery at 52d and Spruce Streets. As the men fled, Williams fired shots at pursuing police, Memeger said.

Biker killed in Center City An unidentified motorcyclist was killed last night when he lost control of his bike in Center City and struck a pole, police said. The accident occurred about 8 p.m. on 23rd Street near Walnut, police said. The victim was taken to Hahnemann University Hospital and pronounced dead about 8:30 p.m. Police said the man was likely in his mid-30s and was not wearing a helmet. 30 years for armored-car job A Philadelphia man was sentenced yesterday to 30 years in federal prison for the armed robbery of an armored car in September 2009.