By Sara Suddes
Staff Writer
A bank robber known as the
”
No-Face Bandit
”
will likely be sentenced to 13 years in prison in April.
By signing a plea agreement, Peter Klein, 50, of Aromas, agreed
to serve 13 years in prison for 11 federal counts of armed bank
robbery.
By Sara Suddes
Staff Writer
A bank robber known as the “No-Face Bandit” will likely be sentenced to 13 years in prison in April.
By signing a plea agreement, Peter Klein, 50, of Aromas, agreed to serve 13 years in prison for 11 federal counts of armed bank robbery.
The state’s case against Klein, which charged him with 27 felony counts of false imprisonment, robbery and possession of stolen property, will be dismissed in favor of the federal settlement, a Santa Clara Deputy District Attorney Cindy Hendrickson said.
With the plea deal, Klein more than halved his potential sentence. His charges in Santa Clara County alone carried a maximum prison sentence of 27 years and four months, according to prosecutors.
Klein’s charges stem from a year-long spree of robberies in Santa Clara, Santa Cruz and Monterey counties – including four Gilroy banks – according to prosecutors.
Attorneys were close to reaching a settlement with Klein when he assaulted another inmate in custody, Hendrickson said. Because the victim’s injuries were not as severe as prosecutors originally thought, the felony battery charge against Klein was reduced to a misdemeanor that will land him in county jail for a year in addition to the 13 years in prison for the robberies. Klein’s case was delayed several times while attorneys waited on the victim’s medical records.
Although records showed that the victim sustained a “concussion-like injury,” he was not knocked unconscious and his injuries “did not turn out to be as severe as we first thought,” Hendrickson said.
The 11 bank robberies will add 11 strikes to Klein’s previously clean record, meaning that Klein could face a life sentence if convicted of another felony after he’s released.
“What’s unusual is to have someone that starts robbing banks at the age of 47 without any prior criminal history,” Hendrickson said.
Klein’s motive “seems to be financial,” she said.
Wearing a baseball cap, dark glasses and a stocking concealing the lower portion of his face, Klein robbed the Chase Bank on First Street, in Gilroy, at gunpoint last March, police said. He ordered at least 10 employees and customers to the ground, according to police, who were alerted by an off-duty San Jose police officer stopped at a red light near the bank. The officer saw customers inside with their hands in the air and believed the situation looked suspicious.
Based on detailed witness accounts, police tracked down Klein, who fled in an SUV, within minutes.
Klein stole about $400,000 from various banks over the last two years, his schemes becoming more and more brazen as they went on, according to Hendrickson.
Though police believe Klein used a replica gun to pull off his last heist, Hendrickson said it looked so real the victims had no idea it wasn’t.
“They thought they were going to die,” she said when requesting Superior Court Judge Hector Ramon to set Klein’s bail at $5 million soon after his arrest. “There’s at least one teller who won’t go back, she was so terrorized.”
Police emphasized the boldness of Klein’s alleged crimes, which spanned Santa Clara, Santa Cruz and Monterey counties.
“The more (robberies) he did, the more and more bold he became,” said Sgt. Ken Binder of the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office. Binder described the crimes as “heartless,” citing a robbery where Klein waved his gun in an 89-year-old man’s face.
Klein will be sentenced 9 a.m. April 12 in Department 110 at the South County Courthouse in Morgan Hill.
