A Southwest Michigan man who robbed a bank, tried to elude police and then crashed head-on into an oncoming car a year ago will spend the next 151 months in federal prison following his sentencing today by U.S. District Judge Paul Maloney in Grand Rapids.
Acting U.S. Attorney Andrew Birge tells us that Judge Maloney sentenced 37-year old Edward Lucas of South Haven to more than 12-and-a-half years in the federal penitentiary as well as three years of supervised release following fulfillment of his sentence along with a special assessment of $100 cash.
It was a year ago on August 18th, 2016 that Lucas robbed the Independent Bank of Sand Lake, Michigan. Court testimony says that Lucas handed a manila envelope to a teller with these words on it: “This is a Robbery. 100s, 50s, 20s. No die packs.”
The bank teller gave Lucas $5,550, and he fled in a silver Chevy Impala. Twenty minutes later, a Kent County Sheriff’s Officer observed Lucas in a vehicle matching the description from the robbery. The officer attempted to stop the Impala, but Lucas led the officer on a high-speed chase, with speeds exceeding 90 mph.
During the ensuing chase, Lucas ran head-on into an oncoming vehicle, which caused his vehicle to flip and roll several times. Responding officers pulled Lucas from the burning vehicle. As officers extinguished the fire in the vehicle, they found the demand note and $5,550 in cash. Lucas previously had been convicted of committing two other bank robberies in 1999.
Judge Maloney noted that Lucas seriously risked the lives of others in fleeing from the robbery. Maloney also noted Lucas had a high risk of returning to bank robbery someday, given that he had two prior bank robbery convictions in Michigan state courts.
The Kent County Sheriff’s Office, Michigan State Police, and Federal Bureau of Investigation jointly investigated Lucas’s case. Assistant U.S. Attorney Davin M. Reust prosecuted it.
The photo accompanying this story on Moody on the Market.com was provided by the U.S. Attorney’s office and shows the wreckage that occurred when Lucas hit the oncoming car head on last summer.
