Utah police have arrested a bank robbery suspect accused of demanding just $1 from employees and refusing to leave afterward, instead insisting he'd wait for authorities to arrive.
The suspect, 65-year-old Donald Santacroce, allegedly entered a Wells Fargo Bank near 300 South Main Street in Salt Lake City on Monday morning and presented a note to the bank tellers that read: “Please pardon me for doing this but this is a robbery. Please give me $1.00 Thank you.”
The employees complied and asked Santacroce to leave, but he refused.
In a bizarre twist, he said they should call the police.
He then sat down in the bank’s lobby and waited for their arrival.
As he waited, Santacroce appeared to complain about how long it was taking for officers to arrive at the scene.
“Donald made a statement to the victims that they are lucky [he] didn’t have a gun because it was taking the police so long to get there,” the arrest affidavit said.
After he made that statement, the bank branch manager ushered the employees into the backroom for their safety and locked the doors. No one was injured in the incident.
When officers arrived, Santacroce was arrested.
He gave the $1 bill to the officers and said he entered the bank with the intent to rob it.
He explained he committed the bank robbery, a federal crime, because he “wanted to get arrested and go to federal prison.”
Santacroce said that if he gets out of jail, he'd rob another bank, and ask for more money until he was sent to federal prison.
It's not clear why he was so adamant on going to federal prison.
He was booked into Salt Lake County Metro Jail around 6:15 p.m. on a felony robbery charge.
He is no longer in custody as of Wednesday. It's not immediately clear if he has a lawyer.
Santacroce had been arrested last week by Utah Highway Patrol in Iron County for a DUI investigation and careless driving, found to be using a license that was suspended out of Missouri, NBC affiliate KSL of Salt Lake City reported.
