Conn. Investigators Moving Forward in Bizarre Bomb Plot, Bank Heist Probe
A home invasion, fake bomb and credit union robbery attempt make a wild case.
— NEW BRITAIN, Conn. -- Law enforcement authorities probing the baffling case of a foiled kidnapping and robbery plot involving a Connecticut bank executive who showed up for work on a Monday morning in February with a bomb strapped to his chest gave the first public indication of progress in the vexing case over the weekend.
“I’m confident we’ll solve this case,” New Britain Police Chief James Wardwell told ABC News from his windowed office overlooking downtown. Wardwell agreed to speak to details of the case revealed in court records.
Police reports say the incident began late at night on Feb. 23, when two assailants allegedly broke into the ranch house in Bristol, Conn., Matthew Yussman, 35, shares with his mother, and ended after a dramatic Monday morning bomb scare in neighboring New Britain, where Yussman works at Achieve Financial Credit Union, according to a 911 call from a bank employee. Shortly after 8 a.m., Yussman, the credit union’s chief financial officer, called an unidentified employee to say he was the victim of a home invasion and was on his way to work with a bomb strapped to his body. His mother was tied up at their home beside a bomb, too, the co-worker relayed to police in a three-minute 911 call.
In the call to 911 dispatchers, the bank employee said: "I just received a call a few minutes ago from one of our VPs, who states that he's a victim of a home invasion overnight,” adding that both Yussman and his mother were “strapped to a bomb” – she at home and he in his car en route to the Achieve Financial Credit Union. The caller advised police that Yussman warned him not to call authorities because one of the people who invaded his house was coming with him to the bank. Yussman sounded as if he was “reading from a script,” the caller said.
"And he's instructing me to vacate our branch in New Britain because one of the perpetrators is going to accompany him to clear out cash. And I have no reason not to believe that…"
The first New Britain cop arrived at the bank just as Yussman rolled into the credit union parking lot. Spotting the device strapped to the man, the police sergeant evacuated the area as a SWAT team headed in. Using a decommissioned military MRAP, New Britain police removed the device, which proved to be a fake, Wardwell said, and no money was taken from the credit union. Yussman's mom told police was duct-taped to her bed around 3:30 a.m. by two men who she described to police as “polite” and “well spoken,” bringing lunch meat and juice to her in the predawn darkness. She says she later managed to free herself before police arrived but it appeared she had been tied up, officials said.
Last week’s new wrinkle in the case - that Yussman had allegedly failed a police polygraph test the day of the incident – drew curious residents even deeper into a widening small-town mystery that, to many in these artsy former factory towns south of Hartford, seems to have sprung straight from the set of a Coen brothers’ film.
Over the weekend, local police officials clarified that Yussman has continued to cooperate with investigators from his hometown Bristol police department.
Wardwell’s boss, 27-year old New Britain Mayor Erin Stewart, also signaled confidence that her police force and state and federal investigators will crack the case. She, too, declined to respond to direct questions about the case, but instead described a wealth of resources devoted to the investigation.
“They have access to technology and resources that other departments would kill for,” she said late last week. “Our people are quick. They close cases. These are professionals - not amateurs.”
Stewart, a descendant of several generations of Italian immigrants drawn to New Britain’s mid-20th century industrial boom, acknowledged that the case is the talk of the town. She said she’s heard a spectrum of opinions from curious constituents, ranging from the media weary – “’Oh brother, here we go again,’ – to the wild-eyed: “Holy s***! What is this? Out of a movie or something?”
In diners, bars, coffee shops and fried chicken shacks, dozens of locals in nearby Bristol declined to talk about the case for attribution. But the communities seem to be hanging on every new development.
“This has been a huge talker,’’ said Bristol Press police reporter Justin Muszynski. “People approach me on a daily basis asking me what the latest news is, asking “can you tell me anything that hasn’t been printed in the newspaper?”…They’re coming right up to me on the street to ask me the latest,” he said. “Daily.”
Tricia Connelly, a former schoolteacher turned school bus driver who dropped into Bristol’s Crystal diner over the weekend for coffee, laughed when told that no one in the area would talk about the case on the record.
“People around here are discreet,” she said, turning a couple heads in the sleepy diner. “But it doesn’t mean they’re not talking about it.”
The question on everyone’s minds is this: was the home invasion an inside job? Was it an elaborate attempt to rob the bank? Local authorities say they’ll get to the bottom of it.
Chief Wardwell said he was in the room and witnessed the failed polygraph test. “We administered the polygraph and he failed it,” said Wardwell, who is vice president of the American Association of Polygraphists. “So we said, “look we have a problem here. Look at this result. That’s when it ended.”
“[T]he results of that test indicated that Yussman showed deception on the relevant test question, ‘Are you lying about your involvement in the home invasion,” according to a search warrant application unsealed Wednesday.
However, polygraph tests are not scientifically reliable and thus are not admissible in court, the Connecticut Supreme Court has ruled. Even someone’s willingness or unwillingness to take such a test can’t be used in court.
Since the events of that morning, little has surfaced publicly about Yussman, except for a Facebook profile picture that shows the ruddy-cheeked bank executive in a green t-shirt that appears to reads “Out of Tequila: Life is Cruel.” He plays night hockey at a local rink, follows the Boston Bruins, the Denver Broncos and the Kentucky Wildcats, favors classic hard rock including Def Lepperd, Van Halen and AC/DC, according to his online profile.
Attempts to reach Yussman by phone and at his home to discuss the case were unsuccessful. He doesn’t appear to have a lawyer.
Investigators unconnected to the case told ABC News they have many questions about what happened.
“[It] just didn’t feel or look right to me,” said former FBI agent Brad Garrett, who has investigated similar home invasion bank robbery attempts. “First of all, it’s too complicated. I’ve worked cases…where people have gone into branch managers’ homes and tied up their wives or girlfriends or whatever, but the whole thing with the mother and the bomb? And at some point he is able to walk into her bedroom, talk to her, walk out?
“All those things, all the details, could turn out to be okay,” Garrett said. Generally, he said in such cases the perpetrators would never let the subject out “out of their sight, and they don’t allow him any communication with anyone."
Garrett said investigators are likely studying CCTV camera footage, reviewing license plate reader records, pouring through Yussman’s email, bank office phone records, credit history - seeking any shred of a connection between the bank executive and the apparently still unidentified assailants. A key lead may be stored in local cell tower.
“We know they communicated with him by cell phone,” said Garrett, an ABC News consultant. “Did they use throwaway phones, cause then that could only help a little bit. Police will be looking for any link to the perpetrators at Yussman’s house such as fingerprints or DNA. “You’re also combing social media, looking for anything of value,” Garrett said. “Typically these guys - assuming this is legitimate, they’re probably going to have a robbery record."
“You don’t do this kind of robbery as your first,” Garrett added.
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