Lake Stevens man arrested in connection to “inner tube” robbery

Suspect being held on $250,000 bail BY PAM STEVENS | EDITOR Police cars swarmed the Lake Stevens Target parking lot on Monday evening, Nov. 3, while police arrested 28-year-old, Lake Stevens resident, Anthony Curcio in connection to the Brinks truck robbery outside of a Monroe Bank of America on Sept. 30.

Curcio had a large amount of cash on him at the time of the arrest and was moving a small safe into another vehicle.
The FBI had been tailing Curcio since October after finding several items left behind after the robbery including the yellow inner tube which was found along with a two-way radio, a stash of money, a wig, sunglasses and a white particle mask.

Allegedly, Curcio lured decoys through a Craigslist ad, each of whom showed up thinking they were being hired to do landscape work, all wearing almost the same clothing the suspect wore during the robbery, making it more confusing to identify the robber.

The suspect sprayed pepper spray into the Brinks armored car driver’s face while he was taking money into the Bank of America, grabbed two bags of money from the truck and took off, on foot, towards Woods Creek to his waiting yellow inner tube. It is not clear if the suspect used the inner tube as a getaway vehicle or used it to transport the money down the creek.

The suspect was not found at the time of the robbery and was able to flee the scene.

Three weeks before the robbery on Sept. 9, a citizen found a stash of items behind the dumpster at the Bank of America in Monroe. The stash included a baseball cap, a wig with a ponytail, pepper spray container, a yellow safety reflective vest, and a two-way radio.

He also witnessed a man exiting a Chevy Trailblazer and grabbing the pile of items and then leaving in the SUV.

The man told a city worker what he had witnessed and called 911, however, the call was routed to Arlington police by mistake.

On a positive note, the concerned citizen retrieved the license plate number on the Trailblazer and gave it to inves tigators.

The “Inner tube Robber” left this yellow inner tube near Woods Creek after robbing a Brinks truck outside of the Monroe Bank of America.

After the bank robbery, investigators realized the connection and found out that the vehicle belonged to Curcio’s wife. Soon the police started to tail Curcio waiting for an opportunity to retrieve some sort of evidence that could tie him to the crime.

“Upon recalling the incident from Sept. 9, the citizen had also seen a vehicle pull up, a male got out and grabbed all of the items and got back in his car,” Debbie Willis, spokesperson for the Monroe Police Department said. “He wrote down the license plate number which returned to Curcio’s wife.  He became a suspect.”

They didn’t have to wait long. Curcio ended up throwing away a plastic bottle full of chewed tobacco into a gas station garbage can near his home in Lake Stevens.

Investigators retrieved the bottle of spittle and compared the DNA sample to one from the mask found at the crime scene. The two samples matched and police were able to make an arrest.

“The FBI was able to get a DNA sample by following him (Curcio) as he walked near his Lake Stevens residence,” Willis said. “He was chewing tobacco and used a Gatorade bottle to spit into.  He threw this bottle into a trash can at a gas station.  The FBI retrieved it from there and we sent it to the Washington State Patrol Crime Laboratory for DNA analysis.  They were able to get DNA from the bottle and the mask that was used in the robbery.  They were a match.”

Curcio appeared in Everett District Court the next day, Tuesday, Nov. 4, where Prosecutors requested he be held on $1 million bail. However, after Curcio’s attorney pointed out that he had a wife and two small children within the community, the judge ordered him held on $250,000 bail.

He was charged with Robbery in the first degree.
Another man, Robert G. Ellis, 26, of Monroe, was also arrested in the Target parking lot and was with Curcio at the time of his arrest.
He was booked into the Snohomish County Jail for possession of stolen property.

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