Police have arrested a suspect charged with robbing a bank in Bethel. The alleged robbery occurred at the Alaska USA Federal Credit Union inside the Alaska Commercial Company grocery store around 11 a.m. on. Nov. 11.
According to a police statement, Bethel police responded to the scene and began investigating. They interviewed witnesses and watched surveillance video footage. An hour after the alleged crime, police arrested a suspect, Ezekiel Thomas, age 34, in front of Swanson’s Grocery store.
Police Chief Richard Simmons said that the suspect did not display a weapon during the alleged crime. “It was very low key. Besides the involved employees at the bank, no other patron or employee of the businesses was aware of its occurrence,” Simmons wrote in an email. Simmons said that police cannot disclose the amount of money that was taken because their investigation is ongoing. He said that it was the first bank robbery to appear in Bethel’s digital records system, which dates back 11 years.
Police charged the suspect with second degree robbery and remanded him to the Yukon Kuskokwim Correctional Center. Police have not disclosed the amount of money allegedly stolen. Police said that no injuries occurred during the arrest or the alleged robbery. Police briefed the local District Attorney’s Office and the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Anchorage about the incident.
Police ask anyone with information about the incident to call the Bethel Police Department at 907-543-3781.
