Sometimes it's hard for prosecutors to get a conviction. The case of Arlington's "Black Hoodie Bandit," judging from evidence the FBI says it found, will not be one of those times.
Starting in November, the bureau says, Dana Campbell began robbing grocery-store bank branches -- specifically First Convenience Banks. She would walk up to the bank window, hand over a note demanding cash and take off with the for a waiting silver car or PT Cruiser. By February, when the FBI released photos of the woman they christened "The Black Hoodie Bandit" in hopes of generating some leads, she was suspected of nine robberies. A $10,000 reward was offered for her identification, arrest and indictment.
(We pause here to ask: "Black Hoodie Bandit?" Really? Did someone at the FBI miss a sensitivity training class or is Geraldo Rivera now a federal agent, God forbid? Maybe the fibbies are fans of the grammar book Eats, Shoots and Leaves.)
Back to the story: Posters of the robber were soon plastered up at FCB branches, showing the woman and her distinctive getup. On March 10, the FBI says, she robbed her 10th bank. An FCB teller in Arlington saw a woman, identified later as Campbell, approach another teller's station and noticed she was wearing a black hooded jacket, a beanie cap, dark sunglasses and black gloves. One of the teller's customers asked Campbell, after looking at one of the posters, "Are you the one who has been robbing all the banks?."
The customer left the bank as quick as she could, after telling the tellers that they were about to be robbed. Campbell then robbed the bank and fled, the FBI says.
March 23 at about 11 a.m., the hoodie bandit went into another Arlington Kroger containing an FCB branch on Fielder Road. Bank employees recognized her, and she ran down an aisle, out of the store and into a gray sedan. Arlington cops were able to pull the car over, and identified Campbell as the driver, the FBI says.
Inside the car, cops found a black hooded jacket, a black beanie, dark sunglasses and a silver-studded black purse the bandit carried in a few of the robberies. In one of the jacket pockets was note that said "This is a robbery. I don't want to hurt anyone." Then there was the ledger.
"Officers also located a ledger in her vehicle with the dates and addresses of various banks in the DFW area that had been robbed within the past four months. All of the dates in the ledger correspond to actual bank robberies that occurred in the DFW area," the FBI press release says.
Campbell faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted. Her preliminary hearing is set for April 1.