The man dubbed the “Windy City Bandit” was sentenced Monday to almost four years in federal prison for robbing a Chase bank branch in Anaheim.
Ryan Thomas See, 25, of La Palma, pleaded guilty in May to a single bank robbery count stemming from the Oct. 5, 2015, heist.
He was initially also charged with an Oct. 13 bank robbery in Orange and a Santa Fe Springs holdup two days later.
“You understand there’s a cost to be paid for your actions,” U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner told the defendant before sentencing him to 46 months in prison.
The judge ordered See to pay restitution to Chase of about $4,000 and serve three years of post-prison supervised release, which will include outpatient substance abuse treatment.
“I am ashamed of (my) decisions,” See told the court. “I didn’t think I was able to ask for help for the underlying issues.”
Defense attorney Jennifer Uyeda said the robberies took place after See became addicted to pain medication during a high school football career in which he suffered concussions.
“I call him my ‘Friday Night Lights’ client,” the attorney said, referring to a movie and TV series about high school football. “Football was his life.”
See was arrested Oct. 15 while trying to escape from the Santa Fe Springs bank robbery in an Uber car he had reserved. Police said he passed a teller a demand note that indicated he had a bomb that he would detonate if police were alerted.
The teller handed over nearly $6,000.
“Moments later, a Whittier police officer saw the suspect getting into a vehicle, which had been parked in front of a vacant residence not far from the bank,” according to police. “A high-risk stop was initiated and the suspect was taken into custody.”
The “Windy City Bandit” was so named for a hat the robber wore emblazoned with the Chicago Bears logo.
After his arrest, upon being confronted with bank surveillance photos from the Orange County robberies, See stated that “he was the person in all three of the bank surveillance photographs,” FBI Agent Steve May wrote in the 2015 criminal complaint.
See claimed he committed the robberies because he owed a “Mexican guy” money for drugs, according to the complaint.
–City News Service