UPDATE 7/16- Lakeland police have identified the suspect as Angel L. Velez-Carde, age 32.
LAKELAND, FL (WFLA) – Lakeland Police caught the man behind two recent robberies, but they don’t know who he is. Now they’re leaning on the community to help put a name with the suspect.
Police are calling the man they captured “John Doe” because he won’t give up his name. But after two robberies this month at the same store that turned horrifying for a child and an elderly man, police are determined to figure out his identity.
Betty Hester had just set up her outside display July 4th when a man rode up to Dixieland Antiques on a bicycle, begging for something to drink. “So my sister Joyce says, ‘I’ll go get you some water,’” Hester remembered. The good deed was soon followed with moments of horror when the man turned on Betty’s 8-year-old great-grandson sitting beside her.
“He walked around the corner and he had a hypodermic needle in his hand,” Hester said. As the man demanded money, he held the needle up to the boy. Her grandson feared he was going to die. “The baby’s sitting there hollering and crying saying ‘I don’t want to die,’ he looked at Joyce and said, ‘Give him the money, I don’t want to die.'”
Betty handed him six dollars in the register before he fled down the street. Police showed up but couldn’t find him. Six days later, he’s back to find Betty and an elderly customer. “He said, ‘You remember me?’ I said, ‘I sure do,’ About that time he grabbed that poor man like this around his neck and had a screwdriver- poked the screwdriver up to him,” Hester described.
After a struggle getting out, the suspect dropped his backpack, and the police K9s tracked him down. He gave police a name, that they know isn’t his. “There’s nothing attached to that name,” Lakeland Police Sgt. Gary Gross said. “There’s no social security, no address, he’s sitting in jail as John Doe but we want to give him a name. We feel confident he has a criminal record.”
The suspect got less than 50 dollars in both robberies. But the trauma he caused the victims was immense, police explain, and they hope someone can help put a name with the man. If you have any information on the suspect’s identity, contact the Lakeland Police Department.
