ALLENTOWN, Penn. – A local man jailed for his role in last year’s armed robbery at First Class FCU here was connected by his DNA to another hold up at Paragon FCU in nearby Bethlehem a year earlier in which $150,000 was stolen.
Gregory Brown, 35, who last year was convicted for a $67,000 robbery at First Class FCU, this week was charged with the earlier incident after police tied him to DNA samples collected at both scenes.
Police traced Brown to DNA evidence on a piece of a handgun left at the scene of the earlier robbery, which occurred Nov. 7, 2006, when one of the assailants used his gun to smash the surveillance video.
Four days after the first credit union robbery, Brown was a passenger in a car involved in a deadly shooting with New York City police in which the driver was killed and Brown was shot in the leg. Inside the car, police found a gun and $26,000 in cash.
Brown and four other men robbed First Class FCU on Sept. 17, 2007. The robbery was similar to the one at Paragon FCU: a takeover-style heist in which all the robbers wore masks and ordered employees and members to the floor while they rifled the teller drawers and the vault.
Police are hunting for Brown’s accomplices in the Paragon FCU hold up.
