Suspected Bank Robber Caught After Teller Tricked Him Into Handing Over His Own Driver’s License

Here’s another story to file under Dumb Criminals. A quick-thinking bank teller got a suspected bank robber to hand over his driver’s license. Needless to say, the information on the license led police to the man who was quickly caught and arrested.

A warrant filed this week in Franklin County Municipal Court says that it all happened about 9:30 a.m. on Monday, June 4 in Columbus, Ohio. Surveillance video shows that it began like most bank robberies, with the man walking into a branch of Huntington Bank and handing a note to one of the tellers. It said that he was armed and demanding the cash in the teller’s drawer. The New York Post reports that stacks of cash of unknown value were handed over. Mixed in with the stacks of cash was a dye pack, which the robber found and threw at the teller. He wasn’t done though. He wanted more. The robber demanded the money in the cash machine located in the bank lobby, and the teller’s quick thinking kicked in. They advised the robber that a driver’s license is required in order to get money out of the cash machine, and the robber’s quick thinking didn’t kick in. He handed the teller his license.

Man gave teller his ID during bank robbery, police say @ColumbusPolice https://t.co/IKcgi8D3hJ

— NBC4 Columbus (@nbc4i) June 21, 2018

The teller swiped 51-year-old David Menser’s driver’s license into the cash machine, withdrew its contents, and handed the cash over to Menser. After the criminal fled the scene, bank employees retrieved the information from his license from the machine and handed it over to police. That gave them everything they needed to nab him. Menser’s cooperation landed him in cuffs for more than the June 4 robbery though. It landed him in jail for other robberies in the area. Police suspected him for at least four others, and using the information on his license, they were able to confirm their suspicions.

The Times reports that Columbus Division of Police detective Brad Thomas who was working on the case against David Mesner says this isn’t the first time he has seen this happen. “This is rare but not unheard of,” he said. “I’ve seen it a couple of other times.”

David Menser was arrested on June 15 without incident according to the detective. Charges against the robber include two counts of aggravated robbery and one count of threatening someone with a deadly weapon in two court cases. He’s currently being held in the Franklin County jail in Ohio.