Costa Mesa Police Kill Bank Robbery Suspect After Chase

Police shot and killed a bank robbery suspect Wednesday after a chase through a nearby fitness center that scattered patrons and ended in a parking lot.

Employees of the Bank of Yorba Linda, who said they recognized the man from a robbery in April, called police and chased the suspect to the fitness center. The man, who has not been identified, died in a hail of gunfire after an armed confrontation with more than a dozen Costa Mesa officers.

Police would not say how many shots were fired, or whether the handgun found next to the victim was loaded. The shooting is under investigation by the Orange County district attorney’s office.

Tellers at the bank, in the 1700 block of Adams Avenue, said they first saw the man early Wednesday afternoon in their parking lot and thought that he resembled a man who had robbed them at gunpoint April 20.

At 3 p.m. they again saw him outside the building, and this time they were sure, employees said. After calling police, several bank employees--one in a car, the others on foot--followed the man down Adams.

“We followed him to make sure he was the one. We didn’t want to lose him,” said Sherry Greer, the bank’s assistant manager who had dealt directly with the April robber.

“We didn’t want to get hit again,” Greer said. “He may have thought we were an easy target.”

The man, weighing about 300 pounds, eventually reached the parking lot between the Girl Scouts of America building and the Family Fitness Health Center, where he found police officers waiting in cruisers and a police helicopter overhead.

As he headed toward the fitness center, police ordered him to stop, witnesses said.

But the suspect ignored police and entered the fitness center, they said. Patrons inside said the man burst into the health club with police close behind, then ran out an emergency exit at the rear of the building and into a parking lot.

A witness huddled on a landing in front of the health club said she heard more than a dozen shots.

Police investigator George P. Wilson would only say: “A confrontation occurred between the subject and he was shot. Paramedics responded and pronounced the subject dead. A handgun was found next to the body.”