Four gunmen stage heist at Barona Casino

Authorities are searching for four masked gunmen who staged a daring robbery at the Barona Casino early Wednesday after possibly setting a nearby home ablaze as a distraction.

Deputies were called to the resort on Wildcat Canyon Road in Lakeside at 2:21 a.m. after reports that shots were fired, sheriff’s officials said.

When they arrived, they found that a glass display case just inside the casino’s front door had been toppled over and smashed, sheriff’s Sgt. Tom Poulin said.

Casino General Manager Rick Salinas said the four men drove up to the entrance in a green Ford Explorer and parked right up against the front door.

When a parking valet walked up to the vehicle, one of the men pointed a rifle at him and ordered him to lie on the ground, Salinas said. Three employees inside the casino were also ordered to the ground, he said.

Surveillance video shows one of the thieves then ran into the casino carrying a chain but was yanked back because it was too short. He then runs outside and comes back into the casino with more slack in the chain. It was still not long enough to go around the box, so he knocked it over, Salinas said.

The man was then joined by two of the other men, and one of them smashed the case with the butt of a rifle, Salinas said.

The case was advertising the casino’s $250,000 “Golden Ticket” promotion and had a small amount of money inside arranged in stacks with $100 bills on top of $1 bills, Salinas said.

“They thought they were helping themselves to $250,000,” he said.

Salinas said about 500 people were in the casino when the heist occurred, but most were unaware of the robbery. The casino has about 101,550 square feet of gaming space.

During the incident, about 20 to 30 patrons near the entrance were directed by casino security to head for exits.

“It was to say the least scary. I don’t think I’ve ever been that scared,” one customer, who asked not to be named, told 10News in an email.

Poulin said one of the men fired a shot at the display. A .22-caliber shell casing was found, he said.

The men gathered up as much money as they could — leaving several $1 bills behind — and stuffed it into a duffel bag and drove off.

“In two minutes, they were in and out,” Salinas said.

A Spring Valley woman who asked not to be named said she was waiting in the passenger seat of her car at the valet entrance when the SUV pulled up and the four gunmen hopped out.

“They were telling everybody to get down, they’re serious, they’re not playing,” she recalled. “I’m frozen, I’m scared, I didn’t know what to do.”

She said she saw them trying to hook the chain to something inside, and she heard two shots.

Her husband, who had gone inside seconds earlier to retrieve their friends, saw the heist from inside, she said. One of her friends was so scared, she fainted, she said.

“They were pointing guns at her. She was shaking and crying.”

Another patron who didn’t give his name said he didn’t realize what the commotion was about until his friend yelled about a man with a rifle.

“We ended up leaving one of our buddies who stayed underneath the tables and heard all the gunfire,” he said.

The robbers eventually sped off in the SUV with the chain dragging behind it, causing sparks on the pavement, Salinas said.

The SUV, which had a pending registration to a used car dealership, was found abandoned about four miles away on Wildcat Canyon Road just minutes after the theft. The bag with the money was inside, Poulin said.

Deputies set up checkpoints at San Vicente Road at one end of Wildcat Canyon Road and at Willow road at the other end and stopped cars going in and out of the area but did not locate the men.

Investigators believe they got into another car and left the area, Poulin said.

Poulin said the four thieves appeared to be white, but their race was hard to determine because they were well covered up. They were all carrying weapons, he said.

The SUV’s driver had a large build and was wearing a black ski mask, a military flak jacket and blue jeans. The second man had a large build and was wearing a black ski mask, a dark blue hooded sweatshirt, jeans and light colored tennis shoes.

The third was thin and wearing a red bandanna or a ski mask, a black hooded sweatshirt and black jeans with black shoes, possibly boots. The fourth was wearing a black hooded sweatshirt and black jeans, sheriff’s officials said.

Deputies are looking into the possibility that a suspicious fire at a 4,000-square-foot house under construction on the reservation may have been set as a diversion for the robbery, Poulin said. The blaze on Ak Uunyaa Way was reported 10 minutes before the heist. Sheriff’s arson investigators said the blaze was suspicious, in part because no electricity or gas was hooked up yet.

In December 2009, the casino was the scene of a murder-suicide. Donnell Roberts, 38, who had been let go from his job with the Barona Gaming Commission killed 43-year-old commission Executive Director Ray Casillas with two shotgun blasts and then shot himself. Roberts blamed Casillas for him losing his job, officials said.