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Touring bandit pleads guilty

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By Dustin Lemmon | Saturday, July 22, 2006 12:00 AM CDT | () comments

A former police officer and lawyer from Indiana pleaded guilty Friday in Rock Island to federal charges of robbing 24 banks around the country — two of them in the Quad-Cities — and stealing more than $150,000 in cash.

Clifton Bruce Davidson Jr., 41, of Holland, Mich., entered guilty pleas in U.S. District Court, Central District of Illinois, to robbing National City Bank, 4575 16th St., Moline, on June 16, 2005, and the Metrobank at 2322 E. Kimberly Road, Davenport, on May, 17, 2005.

He also admitted committing 22 other robberies between November 2003 and November 2005 in Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Tennessee, Connecticut, Missouri and Ohio. He also robbed banks in the Illinois cities of Danville and Normal.

Davidson gave his consent to have all of the cases transferred to the Central District of Illinois federal court. He will be sentenced Nov. 17 and faces the possibility of life in prison.

Each robbery carries a minimum sentence of seven years and a maximum of 25 years in prison. The sentences could be served consecutively, court officials said.

Davidson testified that after he robbed the Moline bank, he went to Kansas City and then onto California before traveling east and then west again.

He was arrested Jan. 31 outside his hotel room in Phoenix. Assistant U.S. Attorney John Mehochko said police searched Davidson’s Michigan home seven months prior to his arrest and found weapons, stolen currency and some of the notes he had given to tellers, instructing them to hand over cash.

Davidson found out his home had been searched and did not go back there, staying on the run, Mehochko said.

In the Moline robbery and two others, Davidson pulled out a gun and displayed it to the clerk. Davidson said he did so in the Moline case after he handed the clerk a note and she asked whether he was joking.

“I shook my head and pointed the gun at her,” he said, adding Friday that he could not remember whether the gun was loaded.

Davidson showed no emotion during the hearing. None of his relatives were present. He is being held in the Mercer County Jail.

Frank Lambert, vice president of operations for The National Bank, formerly Metrobank, said bank personnel do not differentiate between serial criminals such as Davidson and the more common first-time robbers.

“When you have a bank robbery, you don’t know necessarily that you’re dealing with a serial robber or a local person,” he said. “We treat all robberies the same. They are all handled with the same procedures.”

Debbie Jemison, vice president of the Illinois Bankers Association, said the state has seen an increase over the past year in the number of bank robberies committed by serial robbers, but she did not have any statistics Friday.

“They will travel not only from bank to bank, city to city, but state to state,” she said. “In some cases they may stay in one area like Chicago.”

The serial robbers usually have a routine that helps police catch them, Jemison noted. For instance, Davidson always used a note that he gave the teller and a manila envelope to hold the money.

In an effort to make it more difficult for serial robbers to be successful, Illinois banks are now asking customers to take off hats, hoods and sunglasses when they enter. Jemison said the initiative began last month.

“It’s something they’ve already been doing in other states,” she said.

Dustin Lemmon can be contacted at (563) 383-2493 or dlemmon@qctimes.com.