EAST NEWARK –
Seventeen days after a bandit robbed a Kearny bank, another bank just a block away in East Newark was also held up, authorities said.
No one was hurt in either incident.
East Newark Police Chief Anthony Monteiro said a man walked into the Valley National Bank, at Frank E. Rodgers Blvd. North and Sherman Ave., at 9:08 a.m. on Friday, Jan. 10, and handed a teller a handprinted note reading: “I have a gun. Don’t be stupid. Give me a stack of $50s and $100s.”
After the teller handed over a total of $1,100, the robber left the bank and was last seen walking in the direction of Kearny, Monteiro said.
No weapon was shown during the robbery, the chief said.
Once the man was out of the bank, a bank employee hit a “panic” alarm activated at borough police headquarters and officers responded to the scene, Monteiro said.
There were no customers in the bank and only two tellers working at the time of the robbery, he said.
Details about the robber’s appearance were scant. Witnesses told police he was a dark-complexioned Hispanic, wearing a black jacket and jeans and scarf, according to Monteiro, who added that investigators were reviewing images of the suspect captured by the bank’s surveillance cameras in hopes of gaining more clues.
On the morning of Christmas Eve, a man walked into the Chase Bank, at Kearny and Johnston Aves., handed a teller a printed note with wording similar to the note used in the East Newark case and got away with cash reportedly totaling $3,000, according to police.
Initially, Monteiro said, “we thought there was a good chance it was same individual as the one in East Newark but our individual is Hispanic and the other guy is described as a white, blue-eyed male.”
Meanwhile, Monteiro said that police are still searching for the two suspects who held up and robbed three Newark women of their purses and cellular phones in the parking lot of the Pic-Nic eatery on Grant Ave. on the night of Dec. 12.
– Ron Leir
