Serial Bank Robber Gets 15 Year Sentence

          A 50-year-old serial bank robber was sentenced February 26, 2018 in U.S. District Court in Seattle to 15 years in prison and five years of supervised release for armed bank robbery and brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence, announced U.S. Attorney Annette L. Hayes. VINCENT L. FIELDS, 50, of Tacoma was arrested March 22, 2017 following a bank robbery in Renton.   FIELDS tried to avoid a car-to-car search following the robbery by fleeing from police at a high rate of speed.  FIELDS crashed his car into another driver and fled on foot but was ultimately taken into custody.  U.S. District Judge James L. Robart imposed the sentence.

            According to records filed in the case, FIELDS began his bank robbery spree in February of 2017, robbing a Tacoma Wells Fargo branch on February 15 and a University Place Key Bank on February 21.  On March 7 he robbed a Wells Fargo branch in University Place and attempted to rob a different Wells Fargo branch on March 9, 2017.  On March 22, 2017, FIELDS brandished a distinctive submachine style gun at a teller and demanded cash.  The quick thinking teller included a GPS tracking device with the cash.  Law enforcement was able to trace FIELDS’ movements and caught up with him stopped at a Renton intersection.  That’s when FIELDS took off traveling in the wrong lane of travel, striking another car before being taken into custody.  The gun and the cash were recovered.

            FIELDS was still on federal supervision for a 2012 drug trafficking conviction.  FIELDS has a prior federal conviction for trafficking crack cocaine and state convictions from 1995 for second degree murder and possession of cocaine with intent to deliver.

            The case was investigated by the FBI and the Renton Police Department.  The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Vince Lombardi.