'Cell Phone Bandit' Suspect Nabbed
FBI agents arrested a woman Tuesday who was suspected of robbing four banks in northern Virginia while appearing to be talking on a cell phone.
Candice R. Martinez, 19, was arrested just before 4 a.m. at a home in Centreville, Va. after an FBI agent spotted a car nearby with license plates they had been searching for, according to an FBI spokeswoman.
CBS News Correspondent Jim Stewart reports she was arrested without incident and was unarmed at the time.
Martinez will likely face federal bank robbing charges, Stewart says.
The FBI had issued a bulletin a few hours earlier that Martinez and her boyfriend could be heading to Texas, New Mexico or New York, said Debbie Weirman, a spokeswoman from the FBI's Washington Field Office.
"It was a wonderful stroke of luck that (the agent) happened to spot that license plate, and everything unfolded safely and without incident," Weirman told WRC-TV.
Martinez is suspected of robbing four banks, including a Wachovia Bank branch in Fairfax County on Oct. 22 and another Wachovia branch in Loudoun County on Nov. 4. Security cameras filmed the suspect walking up to tellers and handing them a note demanding cash — all while appearing to be chatting on her cell phone.
The surveillance video has been shown nationwide, Stewart points out. It's not yet known whom she was talking with, or even if she was talking at all.
Minutes after the video was shown, Stewart adds, police received 30 phone calls identifying her.
At one point, Stewart notes, she showed a gun.
The arrest comes after Martinez's father Philip Martinez, of Santa Fe, N.M. made a public plea for his daughter to turn herself in. Philip Martinez told The Associated Press he was worried about his daughter, but he refused to comment on the case.
Investigators weren't sure whether Martinez was actually talking to someone while she demanded cash or if it was just a cover, Weirman said.
FBI Special Agent Ron Chavarro, who spotted the car agents were looking for, ordered two men out of the vehicle, and they took investigators to a house nearby where Martinez was staying, Chavarro said.
Police from Fairfax County surrounded the house with FBI agents and ordered the people inside to come out, Chavarro said.
Reports from citizens helped agents track down Martinez's car, Weirman said.
Her boyfriend had been arrested a little while earlier, authorities said. It was not immediately clear whether charges would be filed against some other people who were with Martinez at the time of her arrest.