Terror In Disguise | FULL EPISODE | The FBI Files

in the 1990s Seattle Washington was plagued by hundreds of bank robberies most of the thieves were caught but one continued to elude the FBI wearing a disguise he stole millions threatening to kill anyone who got in his way with no leads and little evidence agents feared the only way to stop it was to catch him in a [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] every bank tellers were spheres to stare down the barrel of a robbers gun thank you the variety of devices to discourage would-be robbers security cameras silent alarms and exploding dye packs but what an elusive bank robber targeted Seattle's banks none of these precautions were effective I'm Jim Kallstrom former head of the FBI's New York office it would take cunning precision and patience to capture a master of disguise the FBI knew only as Hollywood Seattle Washington 1992 the computer revolution was growing technology entrepreneurs were pumping billions into the city's economy to accommodate the newfound wealth banks open branches all over Seattle but neighborhood convenience also meant more opportunity for theft [Music] on the afternoon of June 25th at sea first banks Madison ranch threatened to shoot anyone who did not comply with their demands one trained his gun on the frightened customers while the other forced to tell her to empty her cash drawer [Music] so no [Music] after the bag was filled they demanded car keys from one of the customers who they had watched pull up they warned the tellers not to hit in the lock where they would return and kill someone the two sped away with nearly twenty thousand dollars since the bank's deposits were insured by the federal government the FBI was called in to assist the Seattle police because no alarm had been tripped the bank's security cameras were not activated investigators had no photos of the suspects customers and bank employees described the gunman as being of medium height and build one employee heard the man holding the cash call to his partner using the name mark the robbers had worn gloves so no fingerprints could be obtained investigators attempted to lift shoe prints from the desk where one of them had stood partial treads were recovered which investigators believed were made by sneakers agents recorded the license plate number of the customers stolen car a Cadillac Sedan hours later the stolen Cadillac was discovered abandoned in a neighborhood close to the bank forensic technicians would pour over the vehicles interior but find no fingerprints hairs or fibers foreign to the car seven weeks passed with no leads then on Friday August 14th sand Bank is robbed again though the thief's truck alone wearing a new disguise one of the tellers believed it was the same man he appeared to be round theatrical makeup we didn't rip off any alarm fill that up his take was more than eight thousand dollars and it was just the beginning over the next three months the same man hit four more seattle area banks each time a solo gunman wearing theater makeup a hat and dark sunglasses was responsible he brandished a Glock 9-millimeter pistol and threatened to kill anyone who tried to stop him [Music] on his sixth robbery the thief had gotten away with 252 thousand dollars and investigators still had no leads and no name special agent Shawn Johnson of the FBI's Seattle field office began tracking this master of disguise who had come to be known as Hollywood it's much easier to coin a name for somebody than in calm tall white male in a blue hat so with this person in particular he wore once again this elaborate facial disguise makeup so some are online somebody started calling him Hollywood because of that and that name stuck with him Hollywood had gone silent since he'd robbed seafarers banks Hawthorn branch in Northeast Seattle his take from that location exceeded a quarter of a million dollars [Music] to date Hollywood had grabbed over 320 thousand dollars from Seattle area banks authorities had recovered none of the stolen cash and they still had no clues to his identity as the months passed investigators wondered if he had quit or moved on to another city then on November 24th 1993 just over a year since his last heist Hollywood struck again brandishing his trademark Glock pistol Hollywood herded the customers together no funny he returned to see first banks Hawthorn branch the bank he had previously hid for more than a quarter million dollars he asked for the reserve cash [Music] unsatisfied with the cash more take the order to tell it to let him into the vault in a back room [Music] [Applause] Hollywood emerged with nearly $100,000 [Applause] again he's threatened to kill anyone who hit an alarm no one disobeyed his orders when Hollywood came to the bank's he was very much in control he was played to it agree but it didn't make people comfortable they're very afraid that he would use the weapon he brandished it actually pointed at a number of people during the course of the robberies so we knew that he was not afraid to show the weapon and also to possibly use that weapon against somebody who didn't obey what he told him to do security strategies in Seattle banks at this time included using marked bills to trace stolen money another tactic was dye packs hidden inside a stack of bills the packs contained red dye and an electronic charge the pack detonates and stains a thief when he crosses sensors at the bank's exit silent alarms made it possible for tellers to call the police without alerting the robbers video cameras monitored every corner of the bank so far Hollywood had somehow managed to defeat all these measures July 13th 1994 Hollywood attacked his tent back in two years he used a stun gun to threaten bank employees the teller risked her life fishing a silent alarm Hollywood looted the Castro unaware that patrol units were racing to the scene [Music] all right he fled with nearly one hundred and twelve thousand dollars a witness outside the bank saw him get into a dark blue Dodge Caravan [Music] the second person drill the witness was unable to see the vehicles license tag after police secured the scene another Bank employee arrived for work he told police about an incident on the previous day the employee noticed a man taking notes in front of the bank standing next to a blue Dodge Caravan witness said he was too far away to get a good look at his face appreciate you coming forward any other details to agent Johnson it appeared that Hollywood studied the locations before strike that he would scout out the bank's days before get a feel for the layout who came who went from the bank at given times Hollywood's planning was paying off he had gotten away with over six hundred and sixty thousand dollars he struck most often on Wednesdays or Thursdays the next time he appeared was six months later as he filled his bag that teller overheard a radio call from beneath his coat urging him to exit when he passed the bank sentence a dye pack exploded for the first time he had failed in a robbery attempt the witness outside the back took down the license plate number of the getaway car Special Agent Johnson was able to trace the vehicle we ran the license plates in the cars and they came back to a couple lived in Tacoma Washington south of Seattle so I went and talked to the couple to find out how their card been sold they had advertised the car in a local paper the buyer paid $1,200 in cash without a test driving it the couple described the buyer as a white male in his late 30s or early 40s of medium height and weight based on their description the sketch artist created a likeness of the suspect the FBI now had their first glimpse of what Hollywood might look like [Music] by the spring of 1995 a masked Seattle gunman had robbed 12 banks of nearly a million dollars and left behind few clues investigators dubbed him Hollywood for his use of disguises in theatrical makeup [Music] the only lead that agents had was a sketch and what they believed was the face behind the mask Special Agent Shawn Johnson looked for a pattern if he could figure out similarities among the bank's Hollywood Rob perhaps he could predict when and where he would strike next I went back and visited all the banks that Hollywood had hit since June of 92 when I was looking for some commonality how many doors were in the banks what was the layout of the lobby where was the vault located was it downstairs upstairs on the main floor was the size of the parking lot was it adjacent to the bank was it across the street what kind of Street was this Bank located on Johnson discovered that most of the banks were in commercial districts where area businesses made their deposits the banks also boarded residential areas this enabled Hollywood to blend into the surrounding neighborhood without arousing suspicion he liked three areas of city primarily northeast part of town Madison Park which was just outside of downtown and West Seattle so one scan looking at the types of banks he had the branches themselves and areas of the city we came up with a pattern of likely targets in March of 1995 three years after Hollywood's initial heist the Puget Sound Violent Crimes Task Force was formed [Music] stamped with investigators from five different agencies they had one goal in mind to take Hollywood off the streets Hollywood struck most often around noon and almost always in the last three days of the workweek poor of his past five robberies occurred in late January or early February agents calculated that Hollywood appeared to be going through about $20,000 a month the effective Mike McGann joined the task force in June of 1995 McGann knew the streets and had many bank robbery collars to his credit it was my belief that at least 95 percent of the people that I arrested were narcotics users the other 5% I believed to be gamblers thrill-seekers professionals or people that were working out of sheer desperation where I'd classify Hollywood was that he was a well trained well disciplined professional Magan pored over the security camera photos of Hollywood he noted the weapons he brandished were a 9-millimeter Glock and a stun gun at the time these arms were being considered as weapons of choice among law enforcement the detective also noticed that Hollywood indexed his trigger finger on the side of the 9-millimeter a technique taught to police officers many of the robberies occurred in the late morning between 11 a.m. and noon precisely the time when a shift change for the Seattle police occurred the evidence pointed to a frightening possibility Hollywood might be a cop and the reason I thought he was a police officer is he knew so much about how we operated that he was probably watching us or listening to us he had he was disciplined he was in and out of the banks quickly he moved swiftly he just knew a lot about the policy procedures of the bank he knew that the the areas that he was hitting in were primarily you know residential areas that don't have much police presence in them then something else caught his eye he noticed that Hollywood was wearing a radio on his belt if Hollywood is communicating with a walkie perhaps police could intercept the transmission the detective contacted an electronics expert known as the glitch with his help McGann hoped to gain an advantage I had sat down with this person and showed him the surveillance photographs of Hollywood and the two-way radio he had and he was able to determine the frequency most common to those radios that he would work off and it was two different frequencies the glitch offered to rig up a scanner the gans unmarked car by eavesdropping on Hollywood investigators hope they could pinpoint his whereabouts and catch him in the act the idea didn't work special agent Johnson was stationed outside a bank in Northeast Seattle monitoring the radio when Hollywood and an accomplice struggle [Music] it's about 11:30 I was going to break off about 12 o'clock and all sudden I heard the Seattle police radio saying we've had a bank robbery First Interstate Bank and that was about two miles from my location I heard the physical description I knew at that point it was Hollywood comeback and one of those three days addicted a year before dismissed a bystander outside the bank got the license number like his first robbery the getaway car was found in a neighborhood near the bank the FBI traced the car back to its owner who said he had sold it to a man for cash a few weeks earlier I had the owner come up and look at the vehicle and I said is there anything different about this car from when he sold it he says sure overall condition of your apartment the owner noticed the car had a new battery [Music] agents found that the car had been wiped down inside and out the owner also noticed that two of the tires had been replaced with newer models so I went to trace the the tires found out they had been bought in Tacoma Washington the battery was bought at a Sears store in Tacoma about two days after the car was purchased so I knew at that point that these people whether it was Hollywood and/or his partners were in the area at least two months before the robberies working with a sketch artist the owner described the buyer [Music] investigators now had two composite sketches but they were still no closer to catching Hollywood Supervisory Special Agent Ellen Glasser was brought in to head the task force she made the decision to go on the offensive it's one thing to put pen to paper and to put your thought processes at work and try to solve a case it's another when you take a proactive posture and an investigation knowing that you might get into a confrontation with somebody like Hollywood supervisor realized that a more aggressive stance would place her agents in greater peril Hollywood had repeatedly threatened to kill anyone who tried to stop him we knew he had a propensity for violence and figured that if he was going to these elaborate means to disguise himself to plan the robberies that he probably would not necessarily give up easily as most others did and we were concerned about safety of law enforcement and safety of customers and employees of the bank's hey you think a lot more personnel were assigned to specific areas of the city are targeting the bank's hit most often by Holly so I came up with a game plan saying okay we're gonna be out on the streets on Wednesdays Thursdays and Fridays between these periods of time knowing full well that greed would probably take the better part of Hollywood and he would come back and rob another Bank even with the amount of money he'd already taken on May 22nd 1996 despite the increased presence of law enforcement Hollywood hid the First Interstate Bank in the affluent suburb of Madison Park it was his fourteenth known robbery to generate leads agents reached out to the community we increase the reward to $50,000 that we were offering in the community for tips we didn't want to have the media work against us now we didn't want to glamorize Hollywood and and cause copycat bank robbers to go out and rob banks but we also felt that we needed the public agents saturated Madison Park with hundreds of wounded fliers perhaps heighten public awareness could also help eliminate that neighborhood as a potential target then law enforcement could increased manpower in the remaining neighborhoods the campaign yielded nothing Hollywood had not surfaced in once they consulted a police profiler to learn how Hollywood might react if and when he was cornered - could be someone who was familiar based on his broad knowledge of violent criminal behavior the profiler told him that Hollywood would not go quietly and it was very important for us to hear him say this guy is going to resist arrest this guy will not want to go into custody this guy will fight you this guy is dangerous authorities could only guess when and where Hollywood would strike next and if his gun would remain silent [Music] for almost four years Hollywood had threatened to shoot anyone who got in his way agents were convinced that if he was challenged the masked gunmen would shoot to kill by 1996 a masked gunman known only as Hollywood had robbed 14 Seattle banks he threatened to kill dozens of people for his take of 1.2 million dollars over four years though Hollywood had not fired his weapon agents believed that if confronted he would kill Supervisory Special Agent Ellen glasses showed the task force a videotape of what could happen if they were not prepared we have been using for training in the FBI a video of the tragic firefight that took place in 1986 in Miami where we lost two of our agents and several other agents were wounded what they were doing that day is they were on a surveillance for too dangerous bank robbery suspects so there was some obvious parallels to what we were doing on April 11th 1986 the FBI confronted two armed bank robbers in Miami the shootout erupted the gunmen advanced while the agents were reloading their revolvers killing two of them and seriously wounding five others that Miami shootout was a reminder of how high the stakes were we can't always be a hundred percent prepared but we should be thinking have a plan all right come on to avoid repeating the tragedies that occurred on Miami glass who developed more uniform procedures between the various agencies the Seattle SWAT team trained alongside Special Agent Johnson we did extensive training with them firearms training felony car stops how to take people out of cars different situations and how would respond to a bank robbery that Hollywood had committed and that was all done under Ellen glasses supervision and her number one concern of course was safety of all the people involved detective McGann knew they needed to make sure all personnel were on the same page it also gives a chance to test our communications because the FBI doesn't work off police communications they had their own so what we had to do is get everybody on board on the same radio frequency to prevent the danger of friendly fire all personnel were required to wear clothing with emblazoned logos as Thanksgiving approached Glasser believed they were as prepared as they could be well that Wednesday that day before Thanksgiving in 1996 it started out just like any other day I went to work thinking I was going to catch up on some of my overdue paperwork thinking that I was looking forward to the holiday the next day having a day off the banks would be closed and thinking that people needed a rest because they had been working so hard agent blasted detective McGann and detective Pete Erickson were the last ones in the office when an alert tone came over the radio at 5:41 and upon hearing that I knew that it was Hollywood that it hit and I'm looking around the office thinking well Pete's here and I looked at him as did you want to go he goes oh yeah let's go in Ellen saw me run down the hall and she's yelling Mike what's going I said Hollywood hit you want to go she goes yes so she grabbed her coat and we all left the taskforce office and my car was parked right outside the front door we ran down and turned on the lights and the siren and put the light on the Rope and away we went multiple suspects had robbed a bank in Lake City the Seattle suburb just minutes from task force headquarters as soon as we got into Mike's car I could hear the Seattle police radio traffic and I remember hearing the references to the make up and it was really those references to the pancake makeup that that made it resonate in my head that this was it this was it they got another call a witness had seen a vehicle exit the bank's parking lot in an erratic manner the vehicle matching the description had been spotted [Music] the police believed they had found the getaway car [Music] it turned out to be a false alarm the engine was cold [Music] 20 minutes had passed since the first call Magan was sure that Hollywood had transferred to a different vehicle by now he would need a place to change you would need place to take that makeup off that wig off to change his clothing to put the weapons you know see put the weapons away or the money the getaway car there would most likely be a van detective McGann continued to cruise to side streets in the residential area near the bank from past robberies Magan and agent Wesley knew this was where he would most likely change vehicles some units were responding to one location and Mike was saying that's not him that's not him he'd patrolled in these streets he'd grown up in Seattle he knew every nook and cranny of the town in that area after several minutes of Criss crossing the main roads they pulled up behind a white van there was condensation on the insides of the windows I mean heavy condensation where the beads of water were dripping down on the insides of the van but there were flashlights moving about the van real quick light and it had dark windows tinted windows on it McGann had a strong suspicion it was Hollywood [Music] they called in to check the plates the driver of the van ignore the emergency lights and pulled away [Music] good bad bhiku the investigators had no way of knowing how many persons were in the van or if they had any weapons if it was hard they knew at the very least he would be carrying a 9-millimeter Glock by this time I knew he knew we were behind him he could see me he he just knew we were there and he drove northbound and slowly came to a stop be prepared to approach the idling band good when I got out alls I saw was this person holding the rifle at poor arms and stepped out from the side and took aim at me with that rifle and right then I feared that I was gonna be shot and killed the rifle Jim I get fired into the rear of the van the chase had turned into a firefight on the night before Thanksgiving 1996 three investigators had just fired at a fleeing van after its driver had attempted to shoot them with a rifle they believe the van held a man known only as Hollywood and elusive bank robber special agents Shawn Johnson responded to the call for back my pager went off I looked at it and knew immediately they've been a bank robbery I called the office and was told that Hollywood based on the description that they had gotten Hollywood had just robbed a bank see First Bank Lake City branch in north part of town still several miles away Johnson raced to the location [Music] as the ban came through another stuff back up arrived [Music] the gunman ducked back into the van of the chase resumed special agent blacks who felt it was a mirror than the three of them had survived that's partially by the grace of God because these these rounds were found in the windshield of the car that was behind us so they went right over us they continued to pursue the unidentified gunmen through the residential neighborhood the agent updated their new position for approaching units [Music] they followed the van until it disappeared around the turn fearful he might be driving into an ambush Magan got out and continued the pursuit on foot like detectives Magan told a k-9 officer to cover the right side while he moved up on the left and I was trying to think am I doing everything right I'm alive there's no bullet holes in me my coworkers are alive plenty of help is behind us and I knew plenty of a help was in front of us coming at us [Music] up ahead they could see the lights from an approaching Seattle police cruiser it intercepted the van forcing it off the road [Applause] [Music] the van had come to rest in the front yard of a house investigators still had no idea how many all right Oh daddy sale the side doors brought up but no one came out [Music] [Applause] [Music] one suspect had taken three rounds the bullets had penetrated his left shoulder thigh and stop the other had been hit in his right shoulder and I looked down at him and said what's your name and he said Steve I said Steve what and he said Steve Myers and I said are you Hollywood and he says no the other suspect was taller and heavier than the gunman from the security camera photos police believed he was not Hollywood either the detective turned his attention to them but no one else was inside and I'm thinking where's the third suspect you're saying the suspect got out are you positive they're saying yes he got out when he saw us he took off something oh my god investigators quickly organized a search both on the ground and in the air a third suspect probably Holland was on the run police believed he was armed they did not know how far he could get from his woman as the search continued a forensics team processed the van and in the back of the van there was a guitar case that had been converted into a gun carrying case and a blue nylon bag that it had money in it and it was a big bag of money he robbers had left behind more than a million dollars they also found pieces of a latex mask most likely belonging to Hollywood scattered around the blood-soaked interior investigators found an assault rifle a semi-automatic shotgun two pistols and several boxes of ammunition Hollywood's blocked 9-millimeter pistol it was nowhere to be found could have taken hostage in a house yeah I that did cross my mind that you know maybe he ran into a house and was holding a family hostage I'm gonna hold him until you know the early hours of the morning or traffic until traffic died out or he could be watching us he could be one of us wherever he was and whoever he was Holly would have eluded the FBI once more after four years of pursuit the masked bank robber known as Hollywood had eluded capture again following his fifteenth known bank robbery but two of his accomplices had been taken into custody one was identified as mark Biggins Biggins had been hollywood's accomplice in three of the robberies including their first he wore the reagan mask the other accomplice was steve myers the man who drove hollywood's getaway cars Special Agent Johnson pressed Myers for Hollywood's real name [Music] you need to tell me who this person is where he is and he finally said okay I'll tell you the person you're looking for is Scott Scurlock Scott's Gerlach wasn't a police officer he was a local actor agents moved in on his twenty acre ranch in Olympia Washington an hour south of Seattle [Music] their lap but Mayor was there investigators found a semi-automatic 9-millimeter Glock okay [Music] agents recovered $23,000 in cash [Music] The Searchers also found a dozen pairs of canvas athletic shoes the same kind that Hollywood was reported to have worn in several robberies behind the house agents approached a barn inside they found tools building materials and equipment on the dusty floor one of the agents noticed some footprints that led to a trapdoor it opened into an underground chamber see light switch anywhere agents had no way of knowing if Hollywood was hiding there with a gun [Applause] yeah Scurlock wasn't there but behind it curtain they discovered a second room ladies material it was a complete makeup studio the agents also found a photograph of Scurlock without makeup behind the barn Special Agent Shawn Johnson and his team came across a large treehouse it's at about 60 feet up into the trees it was built on seven cedar trees it consisted of three stories I had numerous ramps that extended out from the treehouse it was something to behold agents searched the treehouse they found no sign of Scurlock police were still patrolling the neighborhood where the shootout had occurred the night before searches had combed the area but found no trace of the fugitive then a report came in that a man had spotted someone hiding in a camper behind his mother's house police responded and approached the camper they identified themselves but received no response an officer emptied a can of pepper spray into the window police come out of the trailer shot [Music] police set up a perimeter around the camper and called in reinforcements agent Johnson had just returned from searching skill arts property within minutes of arriving at the office haven't not even loaded in the evidence I heard on the saddle police radio shots had been exchanged he had a location about two blocks away from the previous night's events so I thought even beginning to unload the evidence I took off again heading northbound out of town lights and sirens to this location every available unit converged on the site Supervisory Special Agent Glasser had gone home after the shootout by that point in time I had decided not to cook a turkey on Thanksgiving I had changed the reservations for where we were going to eat Thanksgiving to a later time so that we could all be together as a family and we were almost out the door when we got a call from the office that Hollywood was barricaded in a trailer no other shots had been fired since that first exchange skirl ex-girlfriend was brought to the scene if it was the fugitive perhaps she could persuade him to give himself up there was no response [Applause] nobody knew for sure who was in the camper out of options the SWAT team was called to action [Music] hoping to flush out the suspect they fired two rounds of tear gas into his refuge they'd heard nothing SWAT members ended cautious and the initial route of communication with the SWAT team said there's lots of blood but we see no body and my first reaction of that was is this guy a ghost or what how can there be no body and then just seconds later they say we've got a body through the smoke a white male could be seen lying lifeless on the floor a gun near his head [Music] Scarlet's photograph was compared to the body it matched [Music] the coroner later determined that his death had been self-inflicted mark Biggins recovered from his wounds he and Steve Meyers pled guilty to bank robbery assault on a federal officer and Firearms violations they were sentenced to 21 years in a federal prison Scott's Gerlach had hidden behind a mask for four and a half years but when the FBI struck back the man they called Hollywood found there was no place left to hide [Music] [Applause] you [Music]

Channel: The FBI Files

Views: 2,311,000

Keywords: FBI, FBI Files, FBI Documentary, Documentary, Crime, Crime Documentary, Crime Patrol, True Crime, True crime daily, Unsolved, Crime Stories, Crime Documentaries Full Episodes, Full Episode, unsolved true crime, fbi files full episodes, we got him, mystery, solved, investigation, police, criminal, prison, jail, bank robber, bank robbery, scott scurlock, hollywood bank robber, hollywood bandit

Id: UadBU41TIHk

Length: 49min 36sec (2976 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 01 2020