Another Las Vegas casino was hit this week, as a cage at New York-New York was robbed in the wee hours of Wednesday morning. At the time of this writing, about 24 hours since the robbery, the suspect has not been captured.
At about 1:00am January 10th, a man armed with a handgun approached a cashier and demanded cash. Money was handed over without incident, it appears, as the man’s weapon remained in his waistband. He then escaped through the south entrance of the casino and fled in a taxicab.
As can be seen in the security camera picture distributed by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, the suspect is a black male wearing black rimmed glasses and a black beanie cap. In the picture, he appears to be wearing a black mock turtleneck shirt, but the police notice says he was wearing a black hooded jacket. The report also notes he was wearing black mechanics gloves, dark jeans, and black shoes, and looks like he is in his early to mid thirties.
This is the second cage robbery on the Las Vegas Strip in a month and a half. In late November, man robbed the cashier of the Bellagio poker room in the middle of the afternoon. It was similarly non-violent, as the crook just walked up to the cashier, showed a handgun, demanded money, got it, and ran out of the casino with the cash in a plastic bag. He got into a silver car at the valet station and escaped.
The man, described as a 30 to 40-year old white male between 5’ 7” and 5’ 9” tall and weighing 160 to 170 pounds, is still at large. The pictures of him are not as clear as the New York-New York suspect, but he looked like he was wearing a blond wig and black rimmed glasses as a disguise, as well as some sort of half-mask or partial bandage on his face.
There was also a man in the getaway car when it was parked at the valet, but he was able to leave the car before the Bellagio suspect drove off. Las Vegas Metro Police Capt. John Pelletier said it is believed that the man was being held against his will and was not an accomplice, though at the time, it was too early to label his presence as a kidnapping. The man was unharmed.
A number of poker players tweeted about the Bellagio robbery as it happened, including actor James Woods. He wrote, “@Bellagio staff were fantastic. They surrendered the money quietly, so no customers would get hurt. Nobody even realized it was happening. Excellent staff, cool under pressure.”
Poker Hall of Famer Doyle Brunson was playing in the Bellagio’s high stakes Bobby’s Room nearby and was unimpressed with the robber’s strategy. He tweeted, “The guy that robbed the cashier cage at the Bellagio should have walked south 10 yards and took our money in Bobby’s Room. He got 35k and we had about 200k in cash waiting to put it on deposit. Waitress said she could have hit the guy as he slowly left.”
