August 17, 2006

Convicted Warren Bank Robber Facing Attempted Armed Robbery Charge

By GLEN WERLING
A former Bluffton resident serving a 10-year sentence for bank robbery is now facing charges for an alleged attempted armed robbery in Bluffton last October.
Tracy L. Lloyd, 33, has been charged with one count of Class B felony attempted armed robbery.
Lloyd is currently incarcerated at the Putnamville Correctional facility in Greencastle serving a 10-year sentence after he pleaded guilty to holding up the Warren branch of MarkleBank at gunpoint Dec. 23, 2005.
According to Det. Sgt. Steve Cale of the Bluffton Police Department, Lloyd entered the S.M.O.kes store on South Main St. Oct. 24 at 3:59 p.m. and appeared to just be shopping for tobacco products.
“He asked the clerk if she could break a $100 bill and she said yes, he then picked up two cartons of cigarettes and two packages of loose leaf tobacco and walked to the counter,” said Cale.
It would be those cartons and packages that would lead to Lloyd’s arrest.
“The clerk rang up the purchases, the register opened, she told him the amount and he said something like, ‘While you’ve got that register open, just go ahead and leave it open,’” said Cale.
The clerk reportedly told Lloyd, no.
“He then commented something like, ‘Yeah, go ahead and leave the cash register open.’ He then pulled his jacket back and she said he had a handgun tucked in his waistband,’” said Cale.
The clerk then said she would go to the back of the store to contact the owner. Cale said that Lloyd then ran out the front door. Store owner Steve Skiles searched all around the outside of the store—including the 4-H Park—for the suspect but was not able to locate him. He then called police.
When Lloyd fled the store, he left the cigarettes and the tobacco on the counter, said Cale. The detective took the cigarettes and tobacco to the Indiana State Police laboratory in Fort Wayne. About a month ago, Cale received word that there were latent fingerprints on the two packages of tobacco.
The lab ran the fingerprints through the Automated Fingerprint Identification System, or AFIS, and managed to match them to Lloyd.
“They did a comparison of the lifted fingerprints off the tobacco and the known standard fingerprints of Tracy Lloyd and the analysis came back that it was a match,” said Cale.
With the AFIS fingerprint identification, Cale traveled to the Putnamville facility in Greencastle to talk with Lloyd about the robbery.
The detective didn’t tell Lloyd right away about the fingerprints, but instead focused on asking him about his choice of tobacco products and if he knew anything about the robbery.
“He denied any knowledge of the armed robbery. He denied even being there that day,” Cale said.
Lloyd even denied having interest in any other tobacco product other than cigarettes and said that he would not buy loose leaf tobacco, said Cale, so the detective pushed him further, asking if he would ever touch or handle loose leaf tobacco. While Lloyd admitted that he had shopped at S.M.O.kes in the past, he denied any interest in loose leaf tobacco, said Cale. “He told me, ‘No, man, I don’t have any reason for it.’”
“I locked him in on admitting that he only buys the buy-two-get-one-free cigarettes. I locked him in on that’s the only thing he ever goes in there for and that’s the only thing he ever gets.”
That’s when the detective confronted him with the fingerprint evidence. According to Cale, at that point Lloyd backpedaled and said, “Oh, well I was in there once with my cousin or brother and maybe he handed it to me.”
Since the article was on the counter and had fresh prints from Lloyd, Cale said he knew that was not going to work as a valid defense. “We didn’t go to the store and pick up every tobacco article. I picked up the articles that the cashier said the attempted armed robber had in his hand and laid down.”
“We’re pleased that evidence collection in this case led to the development of a suspect,” said Cale, pointing out that it was solely on the basis of physical evidence at the scene that Lloyd was developed as a suspect in the crime.
Lloyd is also facing theft charges in Wells County from two events separate from the alleged attempted armed robbery.
He has a guilty plea hearing set in Wells Circuit Court on charges that he allegedly defrauded clerks at the South Main St. Pak-A-Sak and the Country Cupboard Convenience Stores last November by presenting rolls of washers as rolls of coins and receiving cash for them.

gwerling@news-banner.com

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