
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, June 28, 1990                   TAG: 9006280760
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A/10   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: ROCHESTER, N.Y.                                LENGTH: Short

INSIDE JOB SUSPECTED IN HOLDUP

FBI and sheriff's officials said the $10.8 million holdup of an armored car may have been an inside job, and they began questioning past and present employees of the courier service.

The robbery by at least two men with a shotgun Tuesday was the biggest armored car heist in U.S. history.

"The fact that they had so much money . . . it's logical that they had some information," said Paul Bellito, an FBI spokesman in Buffalo. "People have to be somewhat familiar with the routes of travel, what their work habits are, where they stop."

The armored car was seized at gunpoint after the driver and guard stopped at a convenience store for coffee and sandwiches while making a cash delivery to the Federal Reserve Bank in Buffalo, officials said. No one was injured.

The driver and guard told authorities they had been forced to drive to a wooded area, where they were bound, gagged and blindfolded. The robbers put money bags weighing at least 1,500 pounds into another vehicle and fled.

The two employees of the Armored Motor Service of America were given a lie-detector test, said sheriff's spokesman Tom Ryan. He would not disclose the results.

Capt. Neil Flood said dozens of past and present employees were being interviewed. "You knock off an armored car, you've got to know something about the business," he said.

Sheriff Andrew Meloni said the unidentified driver and guard had not been ruled out as suspects.

by CNB