Charges Filed Against Man Wounded in Bank Shootout

The Los Angeles County district attorney filed felony robbery and assault charges Friday against a Los Angeles man wounded by security guards who foiled what police said was an attempted bank holdup in Van Nuys.

Quinton D. Worthams, 20, was charged with four counts of robbery, conspiracy and assault with a firearm in connection with the incident Tuesday morning, in which another alleged bandit was shot and killed by two retired peace officers working at the bank as plainclothes security guards.

Worthams, who could be sentenced to 10 years in state prison if convicted, is being held on $245,000 bail. He is scheduled to be arraigned Monday in Van Nuys Municipal Court.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Carol Fisch said Worthams was one of three men who donned nylon stocking masks and gloves and headed for the door of the Great Western Bank in the 6500 block of Van Nuys Boulevard just after 9 a.m. Tuesday. Two others remained in a car behind the bank.

Before the masked men made it in the door, they were confronted by the security guards in street clothes who opened fire, wounding Worthams four times in the buttocks, authorities said.

Ladon Jayson Reed, who police said was armed with a 9-millimeter semiautomatic handgun, was killed during a furious gun battle with the guards.

Worthams was treated for gunshot wounds at Northridge Hospital Medical Center before being transferred to the medical ward at Men’s Central Jail in downtown Los Angeles.

Police said they have not yet located the other three suspects, two of whom fled in a blue mid-size car before abandoning it. Another escaped on foot through Van Nuys neighborhoods despite a daylong police manhunt.

Worthams was not charged with murder, as are many of those who survive shootouts in which criminal accomplices are killed. Under California law, those participating in a crime that leads to death can be found guilty of murder, even the death of an accomplice at the hands of police or a victim.

But the survivor must have committed a “provocative act” during the crime, said Sandi Gibbons, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles district attorney’s office.

“The evidence presented did not indicate the necessary elements for a murder filing,” she said. “The prosecutor made her decision based on the evidence presented to her by police and investigators.”