Warren man arrested after BP heist

WARREN — A 19-year-old man with two addresses in Warren has been charged with aggravated robbery for purportedly wearing a ski mask and robbing the BP gas station on Mahoning Avenue in Champion Saturday night.

Clayton Dowe of Catawba Avenue Northwest and Coit Street Northwest will be arraigned today in Warren Municipal Court. If convicted, he could get more than 10 years in prison.

The gas station’s 19-year-old clerk said he was in the back room when a black male with dread locks, mask and black gloves holding a sock containing what appeared to be a handgun “barged in,” pointed the weapon at his head and demanded money.

The clerk put two cash-register trays in the suspect’s garbage bag but said he couldn’t open the safe. The suspect then ordered him to put a lock box in the garbage bag.

The 9:22 p.m. robbery was at 5710 Mahoning Ave. The suspect then left in a Ford Taurus.

Based on information provided by the witness and store surveillance video, other law enforcement officers were alerted to the crime, and Deputy Nick Timko spotted a similar car on Garden Street Northwest about 9:33 p.m.

He made a traffic stop and observed a ski mask, black gloves and a sock with a plastic Air Soft pistol inside on the passenger seat beside Dowe and a garbage bag containing two cash register drawers and a metal lock box on the floor.

The gas station manager verified that the cash register drawers belonged to BP.