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Woman who threatened to blow up bank sentenced
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
Judge R. Scott Krichbaum said a plea agreement was appropriate for a four-year prison term for a woman who claimed to have a bomb when she robbed a downtown bank.
The sentence was given in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court to Marion Edwards, 29, who is homeless, who pleaded guilty to a felony robbery charge.
Edwards was accused of robbing the Home Savings and Loan Co. branch on West Federal Street in March by going inside and handing a note to a teller saying she had a bomb.
She then walked to the nearby Western Reserve Transit Authority bus station, took a bus to the McDonald’s restaurant on Fifth Avenue, changed clothes there and then went to a friend’s home, where she was arrested by police a couple of days later.
Edwards did not have a bomb.
Terry Grenga, Edwards’ lawyer, asked the judge to follow the agreement. She said her client had never been in trouble before, has mental-health problems and was not taking her medication the day of the robbery.
Edwards apologized and said she wanted to spend her time in prison to concentrate on improving herself.
“I want to get therapy and take my medicine to make sure nothing like this ever happens again,” Edwards said.
A bank representative was in court but declined to speak.
Judge Krichbaum said a penalty is necessary whenever someone robs a bank and inflicts emotional trauma on the employees there. But he also said the reports in Edwards’ file bear out that she has a mental illness, and he thinks the sentence is a fair one.