A tipster led police to a 39-year-old man who confessed to robbing a First Hawaiian Bank this week in Chinatown, according to federal court documents.
Darrell Lloyd Gayle was charged with bank robbery in a criminal complaint filed Thursday in U.S. District Court. He will be transferred to federal custody later this month, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
He remains at Oahu Community Correctional Center with $710 bail for unrelated charges of possessing liquor in a public place and criminal trespassing. He cannot be released because of a warrant for the bank robbery.
According to court documents, Gayle entered the bank at 2 N. King St. at about 11:40 a.m. Monday and gave a teller a demand note that said, "Money now!!"
The message confused the teller, who asked the man if he had an account with the bank, the documents say.
Gayle became upset and told the teller, "You don’t understand. I want your money now. This is a robbery — don’t make it a **** murder! Be calm and give it to me," documents say.
The teller gave $780 to Gayle, who dropped four $20 bills as he ran away. Another customer picked up the $80 and placed the bills on the teller’s counter.
Surveillance cameras recorded pictures of Gayle entering the bank and waiting in line, documents say.
On Tuesday police received a call from a person identified only as R.L., who knows Gayle and said that Gayle admitted in a phone call that he had robbed the bank. Gayle told R.L. that he took $700 but only had $1 left.
R.L. saw the surveillance images from the bank on TV and in the newspaper and recognized the clothes worn by the robber as similar to what Gayle had worn in previous meetings with R.L.
Police found Gayle on Tuesday and took him to the Queen’s Medical Center when he complained of an apparently unrelated injury. He was arrested that day for investigation of second-degree robbery.
During an interview with a detective Wednesday, Gayle confessed to robbing the bank, documents say. Gayle has two felony convictions for burglary and terroristic threatening.
