Chicago Tribune reporter Rosemary Regina Sobol has the latest details of two convicted bank robbers who escaped from the Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown Chicago early this morning. (Posted on: Dec. 18, 2012.)
SWAT teams forced their way into a Tinley Park house as authorities searched for two convicted bank robbers who escaped this morning from the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center in the Loop.
No one was found in the house in the 6600 block of 175th Street, where a relative of one of the escapees, Mark Conley, is believed to live. But FBI officials said they believe Conley and the other inmate, Joseph "Jose" Banks, were there hours earlier.
FBI agents, joined by Tinley Park and Cook County sheriff's deputies, had gathered in a church parking next to the house as officers closed off local streets around 11 a.m. SWAT teams arrived soon afterward and officers, armed with assault rifles, entered the two-story wood frame house.
Canine units could be seen going in and out of the house as a crowd of plainclothes officers stood outside during the search. The home is a block off Oak Park Avenue, a main street in Tinley's historic downtown.
The SWAT officers left the home and walked down the street with dogs as neighbors followed, taking pictures with their phones. About two blocks down, the officers searched the Metra stop.
Conley and Banks, known as the Second-Hand Bandit who was convicted just last week, were discovered missing from their cell at the federal jail at 71 W. Van Buren St. around 8:45 a.m., according to Central District Police Sgt. Michael Lazzaro. The inmates were last checked at 5 a.m., he said.
A rope could be seen dangling from about 15 stories up along the south side of the MCC, but police would not say whether it was involved in the escape. The rope appeared to be pieces tied together.
The two were reportedly last seen in the Tinley Park area, according to the FBI. It said they should be considered armed and dangerous.
Police cars also raced to the Greyhound station and checked passengers against photos of the inmates, officials said. No arrests were reported there.
Banks was described as black, 37, 5 feet 8 inches tall and weighing 160 pounds. Conley is white, 38, 6 feet and 185 pounds.
Banks, known as the Second-Hand Bandit, was convicted last week of two bank robberies and two attempted holdups. He made off with a nearly $600,000 in the heists, and authorities say $500,000 is still unaccounted for.
Banks was an aspiring clothing designer who claimed to be a "sovereign citizen" who could not be tried in a federal court. He acted as his own attorney and had to be restrained during his trial.
During closing arguments, Banks repeatedly interrupted Assistant U.S. Attorney Renato Mariotti, commenting on the evidence and suggesting photo lineups were rigged. Mariotti raised his voice over the interruptions to remind the jury of the evidence at trial, including $40,000 found in Banks' safe deposit box as well as a fake beard he wore in the robberies.
Security footage played for jurors showed Banks jumping bank counters and wielding a handgun as he ordered employees to open vaults and ATMs at the banks. In one video, a bank worker was shown hyperventilating on the floor of a cash room, clutching his chest and neck.
The other suspect was identified as Ken Conley, who pleaded guilty last October to robbing nearly $4,000 from a Homewood bank last year. He had lived in Tinley Park.
Conley robbed the MB Financial Bank branch at 2345 W. 184rd St. in Homewood on May 13, 2011. A floor host at a Chicago Heights strip club, he went back to work hours later to repay $500 he owed another club employee, authorities said. He was flashing a large amount of cash and was wearing the same black suit and white tie the bank robber wore, according to the criminal complaint.
Conley was caught by Chicago Heights police when he pointed a gun at someone while driving a gold Land Rover. Officers noticed he resembled the surveillance photos of the man who robbed the Homewood bank. Although the bank teller identified him and he was interviewed by authorities, he fled to California and was arrested there in September 2011.
A woman who answered at the home of a relative of Conley said it was "very upsetting for everyone" and declined further comment.
The last escape at the MCC was in 1985 when two convicted murderers enlarged a sixth-floor window and climbed down a 75-foot electrical cord attached to a floor buffer.
Bernard Welch and Hugh Colomb used a bar from exercise weights to knock out concrete and used hacksaw blades to cut metal away, enlarging a 3-inch window slit. The blade had been smuggled into the jail, authorities said.
Welch was serving a 143-year sentence for the 1980 murder of Dr. Michael Halberstam, a Washington, D.C. cardiologist and brother of Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Halberstam.
Colomb was convicted of killing an inmate and assaulting a guard in the federal penitentiary in Marion.
Both men were apprehended months later.
rsobol@tribune.com
Twitter: @RosemarySobol1
