The United States Department of Justice has charged a third man as an accessory after the fact in connection with last month’s armed robbery of the Rockland Trust bank branch in Vineyard Haven.
Romane A. Clayton, 21, of Jamaica, was arrested by the FBI in Connecticut on Friday, Dec. 9 according to sealed documents filed in U.S. District Court and made public Monday by order of a federal magistrate judge. Law enforcement had previously referred to Mr. Clayton as “Person 2” in investigative materials.
Mr. Clayton appeared in U.S. District Court in New Haven, Conn. Monday. He was released from custody on a $100,000 unsecured bond, according to court documents. Conditions of his release include a 24-hour stay-at-home order, the surrender of his passport and firearms, as well as GPS and location monitoring.
On Monday, the U.S. Attorney’s office in Boston charged Mr. Clayton with being an accessory to the crime, saying that surveillance video, witness interviews, cell phone records and bank deposits implicate Mr. Clayton in the incident, both before and after the fact.
Two other co-defendants, Miquel Jones, 30, of Edgartown and Omar Johnson, 39, of Canterbury, H.H., are facing federal armed bank robbery charges in the case. Federal officials have said that three men, including Mr. Johnson and Mr. Jones, held up the Vineyard Haven Rockland Trust on Nov. 17, binding bank tellers and threatening them with guns before leaving in a stolen vehicle with $39,100 in cash.
Mr. Clayton has not been charged with armed robbery.
According to an affidavit from RBI special agent Daniel Conlon, surveillance video at the Vineyard Haven Steamship Authority terminal from the morning of the robbery showed two men arrive in the nearby Stop & Shop parking lot at 8:57 a.m. in a silver Nissan Maxima registered to Mr. Johnson’s wife. The two men exit the vehicle and purchase SSA tickets in cash, return to the car, and then walk on to the 9:30 a.m. ferry to Woods Hole, according to surveillance video.
The affidavit states that in interviews, Mr. Johnson and Mr. Jones identified one of the men in the video as Mr. Clayton. The other individual who arrives at the terminal with Mr. Clayton has not been identified and is referred to in court documents as “Person A.”
After Mr. Clayton and Person A depart the Island, surveillance video from the Stop & Shop parking shows Mr. Johnson exit a blue sedan with a missing rear hub cap and enter the silver Nissan Maxima, according to the affidavit. Video shows the blue sedan leave the parking lot. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Johnson drives the Nissan Maxima into the standby line, waits for approximately two hours, and boards the 12:30 p.m. freight ferry to Woods Hole.
According to federal prosecutors, Mr. Johnson initially said in interviews with police that he then picked up Mr. Clayton in Woods Hole and drove with him to New Hampshpire. But after being shown surveillance video from the terminal, Mr. Johnson revised his statements, according to the affidavit, saying he drove with Mr. Clayton and Person A, and dropped Person A off on the highway at an unknown exit in New Hampshire. Mr. Johnson said he had not met Person A before picking him up in Woods Hole.
Mr. Johnson was arrested in New Haven. Conn., on Nov. 25. According to police, Mr. Clayton and a different individual, referred to as “Person B,” whose identity is known to law enforcement but has not been publicly named, were with Mr. Johnson in his vehicle when he was arrested and agreed to interviews with police.
In the interviews, Person B admitted to making cash deposists at a bank in Waterbury, Conn., that matched deposit slips that were found in Mr. Johnson’s car when it was seized at his house in New Hampshire. Person B identified Mr. Clayton as the other person with him in the car when he made the bank deposits in Connecticut, according to the affidavit.
The affidavit says Mr. Clayton contradicted himself during his interview, but he was not placed under arrest.
“Once at the station, Clayton gave conflicting accounts of his whereabouts over the past few days,” the affidavit states.
During the interview, police also seized Mr. Clayton’s phone, and used call detail records to place him on the Vineyard the day before the robbery, saying he exchanged three incoming and two outgoing calls with Mr. Jones that went through a Vineyard cell tower. They were the only calls he made that day, police said.
On the day of the robbery. Mr. Clayton placed a call at about 9:58 a.m. that used a cell site consistent with being on the ferry, the affidavit states. He then received a call from Mr. Jones about a half hour later that used a Woods Hole cell site, police said, consistent with video showing that he departed the Island.
On Nov. 18, the day after the robbery, cell records show Mr. Clayton’s phone used cell towers in Canterbury, N.H., according to the affidavit. One day later, on Nov. 19, calls place him in Waterbury, Conn. — the location of the bank deposits made on Nov. 20, police said.
Mr. Johnson and Mr. Jones both identified Mr. Clayton in police interviews after being shown surveillance video from the Steamship Authority parking lot. The affidavit said Mr. Clayton and Mr. Johnson are both brothers of a woman with whom Mr. Jones has children.
Mr. Johnson said in police interviews that he and Mr. Clayton were on Martha’s Vineyard to meet with Mr. Jones about his alleged infidelities in his relationship with their sister.
A press release from the U.S. Attorney’s office in Boston states that Mr. Clayton was arrested in Connecticut on Friday. Dec. 9. Federal prosecutors have not set a date for Mr. Clayton’s appearance in court.
“The investigation remains active and ongoing,” the press release states.
Updated to include additional details from an affidavit filed in federal court, and conditions of Mr. Clayton's release.
Comments (10)
Comments
Comment policy »