Volume 46 - No. 11
March 17, 2016
by Frederick Gomez
As unwarranted as it may seem, some have viewed him as something of a cult hero; to mainstream society and established law enforcement, he remains a notorious bank villain, considered armed and dangerous. Going on five years now, his status with the FBI remains the same: a fugitive at large who has stifled all attempts to capture him. The FBI has bestowed upon him a unique name that would become nationally known, “The Geezer Bandit,” and he is, without question, the most infamous bank robber in San Diego County history.
The Geezer Bandit’s notoriety refused to be restrained within the limits of San Diego County when he stopped being just a local news story and suddenly plunged into the national media limelight. Never before has a San Diego senior citizen, who robs banks for a living, captured the fascination of a national audience on primetime television. On February 5, 2011, the popular weekly television show, “America’s Most Wanted,” placed the Geezer Bandit center stage as one of the FBI’s most wanted criminals in America. Overnight, the Geezer Bandit became a national topic of intrigue, the subject of animated discussions around the water coolers at work, or even the center of a heated debate at a sports bar or other eatery, and not just here in Southern California but, as far away as New York, Florida, North Dakota, South Carolina and all points in between. No San Diego County bank bandit in recorded history has ever achieved such wide-spread infamy; not even a close second shows up as a blip on the radar screen. What keeps driving the public interest and fascination over the geriatric bank robber are the wide-ranging venues which, surprisingly, keep his name alive even on late night talk shows. On television’s “Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson,” host, Ferguson, took humorous stabs at the Geezer Bandit phenomenon: “Police in San Diego are looking for a 78-year-old bank robber. How are you looking for someone and you already know his exact age?” Ferguson didn’t let up, “Police have nicknamed the robber the “Geezer Bandit.” They describe him as “armed and flatulent.” And finally, “Victims of the Geezer Bandit’s last robbery say he threatened to tell them stories of his grandkids.” Jay Leno and other television show hosts also took comedic swipes at San Diego’s Geezer Bandit, as well. Such humor flies in the face of law enforcement agencies, who do not find anything to joke about regarding their attempts to apprehend a most dangerous fugitive still at large.
Also driving the controversy and fanning the flames of fascination are mysterious unknowns and missing pieces to a most elusive and seductive puzzle. For example, John Walsh, host of “America’s Most Wanted,” told a national television viewing audience that he believes the Geezer
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Bandit to actually be a much younger person in brilliant disguise who has managed to fool and elude the finest minds in law enforcement. If Walsh’s early speculation proves correct, it may provide a crucial key in solving a string of sixteen consecutive bank robberies that have successfully stifled both the police and the FBI. Leaving no stone unturned, the theory of the Geezer Bandit actually being a master of disguise is a serious consideration. The FBI officially describes the Geezer Bandit as follows: white male, approximately 60-70 years old, 5’ 10” to 6’ tall, 190 to 200 lbs, average build. Aside from this description, the FBI lists this notable attachment: “Possibly wearing a synthetic mask and gloves to hide true physical characteristics.” He is also believed to be left-handed. Is it a ‘reasonable’ theory, in the case of the Geezer Bandit, that such an old-man disguise, such as a face mask, can be so realistic as to avoid suspicion, even at a close distance? This is perhaps unlikely at the normal Halloween outlet, but what about at the high-end level, such as
at a highly professional Hollywood-quality disguise-and-mask store? In researching this article, I decided to go online to view some of the most professional and realistic face masks in the world and found myself believing that, yes, this could in fact be a real-life possibility in regards to the Geezer Bandit.
The masks I saw were on a Hollywood professional level that blurred the line between the real and unreal. One company is called SPFX Masks (www.spfxmasks.com/), now a Division of Hollywood Mask Masters, and they offer a variety of the most realistic old-man masks I have ever seen, under a variety of different names, such as “The Elder,” “The Senior Citizen,” “The Retiree,” and believe it or not, “The Geezer,” all priced at nearly $800 each. Interestingly, all the aforementioned masks look almost identical to the photos of the Geezer Bandit that were captured on bank surveillance cameras. On May 27, 2011, after the Geezer Bandit held up the Heritage Oaks Bank, at 310 Morro Bay Blvd., in Morro Bay, California, Morro Bay police detectives
‘The Geezer Bandit’ Continued on Page 2
scrambled with intent to serve a search warrant on SPFX Masks, Inc. (mentioned above) to reveal all names and personal information of customers who had purchased silicon masks, such as “The Elder,” “The Geezer,” and “The Senior Citizen,” to cite just a few examples. According to Rusty Slusser, owner of SPFX Masks Inc., he has sold about a hundred masks called, “The Elder.” As such, Slusser has kept an open dialogue with various investigators, including the Morro Bay Police Department, San Diego police detectives and, of course, the FBI. It is already well documented that SPFX Masks, Inc. sold a realistic face mask called “The Player,” in April of 2010, to a man in Ohio who used it to rob a bank there. There is an added twist to this story. The mask is of an African-American, and the white Ohio robber who bought it online from SPFX Masks (headquartered in Van Nuys, California) used it to throw police off his trail. And it worked. The only clue that led to the robber’s arrest was that his Volvo car interior was splattered with red dye from a dye-pack that was secretly slipped into the bag containing the