Armed robber of Greenwich bank finally arrested

It was January 25, 2017 around 4:30 pm. Jose Luis Martinez, age 28 at the time, from Iowa, robbed the Patriot National Bank at 100 Mason Street in Greenwich at gunpoint. Police tried to stop him, but he got away. He fled the scene in a stolen truck that he crashed and abandoned and then ran on foot into a residential area of Port Chester. He got away with an undisclosed amount of cash and no one was injured.

Three weeks before the Greenwich bank robbery, on January 5, 2017, Martinez robbed a bank in Secaucus, New Jersey. He was sentenced to over 7 years in prison and ordered to pay $31,000 in restitution.

Armed bank robberies are a rare occurrence in Greenwich. However, 2017 was an unusual year. In late April 2017, there was another armed bank robbery at the Chase Bank branch in Riverside. The robber was David Byers, age 34 at the time, from San Diego. The Chase bank was hit twice by Byers over two days and he also hit a nearby Citgo gas station. Like Martinez, he was involved in a multi-state robbery spree and high speed police pursuit. Byers was sentenced to over 7 years in prison and ordered to pay $14,753 in restitution.

Between the Lines: These days it's much easier and far less risky to steal from a bank by sitting at home in front of a computer and committing identity theft.

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