PORT ANGELES — Like grainy footage of Bigfoot, security images of the suspect in a Tuesday bank robbery will likely be scrutinized to determine: Is it, or isn’t it?
Depending on who you ask, the man who held up the Kitsap Bank branch on East Front Street at 10:40 a.m. is probably the same guy who robbed the Sequim Kitsap Bank branch in February.
Or else, there is no way of telling.
Either way, the second bank robber on the North Olympic Peninsula in 2006 looked the same, wore the same clothes and practiced the same mode of operation: He was low key, flashed a firearm and was last seen escaping on foot.
The man who robbed both banks was described as Caucasian, in his 50s, clean-shaven, and wearing a baseball cap and a plaid shirt.
Investigators with the FBI believe it is the same guy.
But a detective with the Port Angeles Police Department says there is no proof that the two bandits are the same man.
“There is no way of knowing,” Detective Sgt. Steve Coyle said.
“He was similar in appearance, but outside of that, there is no information to connect the robberies.”
Coyle declined to say what type of firearm the robber used and the amount of money stolen in Tuesday’s Port Angeles holdup.
FBI Special Agent Robbie Burroughs, a spokeswoman for the bureau’s Seattle office, said investigators believe the heists were committed by the same man.
Burroughs said that it would be unlikely that another bank robber would borrow an earlier bandit’s garb to throw off investigators.
“Most of them don’t have plan,” she said.
“The idea that he would put that much thought into covering his tracks would be extremely unusual, if not completely unprecedented.”
