PASADENA : Bank Robber Arrested After Getaway in Taxi
A man who took a taxi to rob a bank in Pasadena was arrested Thursday morning after a bank manager reported the taxi’s license plate number.
Arthur Salaiz Valencia, 34, of Sierra Madre allegedly instructed a cabdriver to wait for him while he was in the Bank of America branch at 3701 E. Foothill Blvd., said Pasadena Police Lt. Van Anthony.
Valencia presented the teller with a demand note, then fled with more than $800 in cash into the waiting cab, Anthony said. As he fled, a bank manager wrote down the license of the taxi. Police stopped the cab a few miles away.
After his arrest, Valencia, an unemployed painter with three children, told police that he robbed the bank to support a cocaine habit, Anthony said. He also confessed to robbing a Security Pacific Bank branch the same way the day before.
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