Ski Mask

A young man riding a bicycle and wearing a ski mask robbed a Pizza Hut in the 3100 block of Mountain Road Saturday of an undisclosed amount of money, county police said yesterday.According to police, the store manager and an employee were leaving the store about 4 a.m. Saturday when the man approached and pointed a revolver. The man forced them into the store and demanded money, police said. He then forced the employees into a bathroom, locked the door and fled.Police are seeking a white male, about 17 years old, 5-foot-5 and with a thin build.

The Valencia Motel in the 10100 block of Washington Blvd. was robbed early Saturday by a man who kicked in the rear office door, Howard County police said.The robber demanded money from the clerk behind the counter about 1 a.m., police said, and took $180 from the drawer.A police report said the clerk activated an alarm after the man fled through the rear door.The robber was wearing a black jogging suit and a ski mask.Pub Date: 12/24/96

Howard County police arrested a man wearing a ski mask at an automated teller machine Saturday night in connection with an earlier robbery at a Jessup motel.In the 9 p.m. robbery, two men knocked on the door of a room at the Red Roof Inn in the 8000 block of Washington Blvd., police said. When a man inside responded, two men forced their way past him.Once inside, intruders tied up the man and stole his credit cards and an undisclosed amount of cash, police said.The victim eventually freed himself and reported the robbery.

Police have released composite sketches of two suspects in an armed robbery of an Eldersburg bank. Witnesses saw the faces of two of four men in the robbery of FCNB Bank in the 6200 block of Sykesville Road at 3:22 p.m. Friday. Two of three men were briefly seen before they pulled large hooded sweat shirts over their heads as they entered the bank. The third man wore a ski mask, and a fourth drove the getaway vehicle, described as a small green sedan. Anyone with information in the case should call 410-386-3000.

A man wearing a ski mask and carrying a toy pistol didn't get what he expected when he entered the Towson Shell station and confronted Michael Z. McCarthy: Instead of money, he got assorted minor hurts in a free-for-all that spilled out of the station into the parking lot -- and ended with an arrest, police said.McCarthy, 19, of the 8900 block of Mount Patapsco Court in Ellicott City and his roommate, 20-year-old Hyoun T. Kim, entered the station about 2 a.m. yesterday, according to a police report.

Police are searching for three men who put on masks and robbed a convenience store in Edgewood at gunpoint this month, the Harford County Sheriff's Office said Tuesday. Police don't know the identities of the suspects. They also said they believe there were witnesses to the event who have yet to be identified. About 2:55 a.m. on Aug. 13, the three men entered the 7-Eleven store in the 1000 block of Gateway Road in Edgewood and pointed at least two guns - a black handgun and a dark colored "long gun" - at the clerk, demanding money, police said.

Police are seeking 2 men after attempted holdupHoward County police are searching for two young men who tried to rob a 30-year-old Virginia man as he locked his car in a parking garage in Town Center Thursday night.The victim was uninjured, police said.Shortly after 9:30 p.m. Thursday, two men wearing ski masks approached the man in a parking garage in the 10200 block of Wincopin Circle, police said.One of the masked men, armed with a handgun, demanded the victim's cash, police said. Then both robbers searched the victim and ran away when they found no money.

A 42-year-old Towson man was arrested yesterday outside his home and charged in the midmorning robbery of a nearby health food store -- the latest in a series of holdups in the area.Police were called at 10:37 a.m. to the Power House Natural Food Store in the 100 block of Shealy Ave., where a robber with a ski mask, implying that he had a weapon, ordered several people to lie on the floor and took an undisclosed amount of money, police said.Following an escape route pointed out by witnesses, officers arrested Darnell H. McManus at his house in the 400 block of Jefferson Ave. A garbage bag containing money, a jacket, gloves and a ski mask were found in a yard next door, said Detective Robert E. Marley.

A 28-year-old Glen Burnie man was sentenced yesterday to nearly 13 years in federal prison for robbing two banks with a shotgun last year in Arbutus and in Severn, according to the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. U.S. District Judge William M. Nickerson also ordered Joel Travis Nunnally to serve three years of supervised probation when he is released. Prosecutors said Nunnally robbed a Bank of America branch in the 5200 block of East Drive in Arbutus on June 8, 2007, wearing a dark-colored ski mask and gloves.

A resident of a program at Springfield Hospital Center was sentenced to 30 years in prison yesterday in Carroll County Circuit Court for the rape last year of a female patient. Circuit Judge Michael M. Galloway found Brian Franklin, 40, guilty of first-degree rape in the July 22, 2001, attack after hearing an undisputed statement of facts from a prosecutor. The judge suspended 10 years of a 40-year sentence, and ordered five years of probation. Franklin, who also used the last name Houston, lived in New York and Alabama before visiting relatives in the Washington suburbs, where he admitted himself to the hospital, said Assistant State's Attorney Natasha M. Byus.