Police: Officers interrupt robbery in progress, ending multistate crime spree

FRANKLIN, Tenn. — Police in Tennessee said that an alert clerk and their officers worked together to stop a violent crime spree spanning multiple states.

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The Franklin Police Department announced four arrests in a news release, and said the men were arrested after a robbery at the Thoroughbred Village Shop Center. Officers patrolling the mall were contacted by an employee of Jared Jewelers before 8 p.m. on Saturday to report that a person had entered the store wearing a hoodie, surgical mask, hat and sunglasses. The sunglasses struck the employee as odd because it was dark outside.

Franklin police released video taken by witnesses in the mall and recorded by officers’ body cameras that shows masked people using sledgehammers to smash glass cases to steal jewelry.

Police said that minutes later, a van pulled into the fire lane in front of JC Penney at the CoolSprings Galleria. Officers said four masked suspects jumped out and entered the store.

“(The suspects) ran in with pepper spray and ski masks and sledgehammers and they just started smashing the glass and grabbing whatever they could and putting it in bags,” a man who said his teenage daughter was in the store told WKRN.

Police said that one suspect pepper sprayed an employee, while another fought an officer who responded to the robbery. One video from the scene shows the officer wrestling with a suspect, who at one point attempts to grab the officer’s weapon.

Franklin police identified the suspects as Quintaurus Harris, Dunterious Traylor, Keisean Elliott and Marcanzo Banks. In the news release, police said they believe the suspects have been involved in at least five robberies across Tennessee and Arkansas, with combined losses of more than $1.5 million.

All four men were charged with aggravated robbery, felony vandalism and evading arrest.