UPDATE: Suspects In Botched Armored Truck Robbery Identified
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) - A suspect was shot and later found hiding in a dumpster after a botched armored truck robbery in front of a Walmart in south Sacramento on Tuesday afternoon.
At around 2:30 p.m., two would-be robbers tried to hold up an armored vehcile in the parking lot of the Walmart at 6051 Florin Road, according to sheriff's deputies.
As a guard was walking back to the vehicle with bags of cash, he was approached from behind and hit with a stun gun. He fell to the ground and dropped the money.
"I had just gotten inside Walmart when I saw this guy grab the money bags, snatch it out the armor guard's hand," witness Marian Gage.
But for some reason, the suspect got spooked.
"I see the guy drop the bag and take off running," Gage said.
The armored guard but got back to his feet, pursued the suspect and shot him in the leg, according to Sacramento County Sheriff's Deputy Jason Ramos.
"During that foot pursuit he fired his weapon several times," Ramos said.
The man, identified Wednesday as Raymell Eason, 41, tried to get into a vehicle with another suspect waiting in dark-colored Chevrolet Impala but the guard fired several shots at the car, hitting windshield and hood, and the robbery suspect ran off across Florin Road.
The second suspect then drove the Impala at the armored car guard and more bullets started flying. The car drove off, but deputies arrested the driver a few hours later at a Sacramento residence.
The driver also was identified Wednesday as Keith Lamont Smith, 55. Smith faces charges including attempted robbery, conspiracy, assault with a deadly weapon and unlawful possession of a controlled substance. He is being held on $100,000 bail at the Sacramento County Jail.
Eason was booked on charges of attempted robbery and assault with a deadly weapon. He is being held on $150,000 bail.
Eason was found by deputies a few minutes after being shot, hiding in a dumpster across the street behind a Del Taco. He was taken into custody and transported to an area hospital with a non life-threatening gunshot wound to his leg and released from the hospital Wednesday.
The guard did not require medical treatment and no one else was injured in the incident, but several were frightened.
Phil Gardner was trying to protect his daughter Salina during it all.
"I was scared," Salina said.
"I put my little girl down and then I ducked down. And then he ran over there," Phil said.
But the would-be robbers should have known better, Gage said.
"You can't just snatch money from an armored car and get away," she said.
