Man Sentenced in Armored Car Holdups

A 35-year-old transient was sentenced Thursday to 14 years in prison for taking part in a shoot-out with an armored car driver at a crowded Gelson’s Market in North Hollywood and in two robberies in Diamond Bar.

Van Nuys Superior Court Judge Darlene E. Schempp sentenced Calvin Michael Grant on four counts of robbery and one count of assault with a deadly weapon. Grant had pleaded guilty to the charges on Nov. 20 before his trial was set to begin.

Grant’s co-defendant, Steven Bernard Young, is facing trial on the same charges.

According to Deputy Dist. Atty. Lisa Kahn, the prosecutor on the case, Grant and Young attempted to rob the driver of an armored car as he picked up money at the Gelson’s Market at 4738 Laurel Canyon Blvd. As customers dove for cover, the driver of the armored car, David E. Forney, fired back, wounding Grant in the thigh.

No one else was injured, and Grant and Young escaped in a car without getting any money, Kahn said.

Grant was arrested four days later in a Brentwood motel after officers found a plastic bag containing bloody clothing outside and linked him to the robberies, Kahn said. Young was arrested about six months later, she said.

Grant also pleaded guilty to stealing $37,500 from an armored car in an armed robbery outside a K mart in Diamond Bar on Dec. 22, 1987, and to stealing $5,000 during a robbery of a Coast Savings in Diamond Bar on May 17, 1988, prosecutors said.