A cab driver is strapped with a bomb and forced to rob a bank.

Witnesses saw this man remove a disguise

Suspect: Gender: Male DOB: Approx. 1941 to 1951 Height: 6’ Weight: 160 lbs. Hair: Short-cropped, salt and pepper

CASE DETAILS

In Modesto, California, 65-year-old Harvey McCloud had been a devoted cab driver for 10 years.   Harvey had seen just about everything, so he wasn’t too surprised when a man in a turban with a phony beard and mustache flagged him down one afternoon:

“It was just a normal fare. He did have a turban, but we have several of those in Modesto, so I never thought anything about it.”

The passenger spoke in a coarse whisper.   He only had about half the fare, but he said he could pick up the rest at his brother’s house, which was on the way:

“He said his brother lived on that road, so I didn’t think too much about it until he told me to stop after a couple of blocks. So I stopped the car and turned around, and here that gun was staring me right in the nose. So I just basically thought it was a robbery.”

But this was no ordinary robbery.   Harvey McCloud was about to be turned into a human time bomb.   The gunman chained a black metal box with a numeric keypad onto Harvey’s body.   He ran a wire lead around Harvey’s neck and clipped it shut.   Then, according to Harvey, the gunman activated the black box:

“I was terrified. My mind was going a hundred miles an hour, and I was trying to figure out how am I going to get out of this?”

Ten minutes later, Harvey was on his way back to Modesto.   On the drive there, the gunman gave Harvey detailed instructions for robbing a bank.   Harvey was to take a box, which carried a second bomb, into the bank and leave it there:

“Well, he kept reminding me that he could set this bomb off by his cellular telephone. And me, I don’t know that much about electronics, but what you see in the papers and TV, you can do about anything with electronics nowadays, so I believed him.”

Once inside, Harvey handed the bank’s manager, Denise Hutchinson, a letter:

“I thought I was dealing with an irate customer, because he was agitated. I proceeded to read the letter, and about midway through, it shocked me… And it upset me.   I looked around the lobby, and it was very scary that if I didn’t do the right thing that all of us could be blown up as a result of that.”

Denise Hutchinson decided to comply with the gunman’s orders.   She and another bank employee filled a briefcase with the exact amount of money demanded in the letter.   The robbery had gone according to plan.   But then Harvey performed a quiet act of heroism:

“I didn’t want to see innocent people… get killed. I couldn’t do much about me, but I could at least take the bomb with me and to protect the other people in the bank. So I walked out the door with it.”

In the back of the cab, Harvey found a list of instructions.   First, he drove to a hardware store 15 minutes away.   He parked the cab, leaving behind the cash and the car keys.   Then he walked half a mile to a pay phone.   The instructions said the gunman would phone Harvey with directions for dismantling the bomb:

“I waited about 5, 10 minutes, and no call came in, so I happened to look at the telephone, and it said no incoming calls. So then I knew something was up. So then that’s when I called my dispatcher and told her what happened.”

Within minutes, the police were on the scene and the area was evacuated.   Harvey McCloud sat alone in the eye of the storm:

“I wasn’t very calm inside. I was… shaking, my stomach was rolling, I had all these things going through my mind, just wondering how long I was going to be in this old world.”

Eventually, the bomb squad arrived and released Harvey from the device.   X-rays later determined that both bombs were fakes. The robbery had been perfectly executed … almost.   Two witnesses later told police they had observed an unusually dressed adult male outside of the bank at the time of the robbery.   However, they were unable to provide police with a license plate number.

This case is still unsolved.   The statute of limitations has expired on the robbery, but not on the kidnapping.   Witnesses described the suspect as about 6 feet tall and 160 pounds.   The man has short-cropped hair that is silver or salt-and-pepper in color.

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Watch this case now on Amazon Prime in season eight with Robert Stack and in season six with Dennis Farina. Also available on YouTube with Dennis Farina. Various seasons available now on Hulu.

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