A can of Red Bull found in a Massachusetts casino led the FBI to a man suspected of carrying out more than a dozen bank and credit union robberies over the course of a year.
According to the US Attorney’s Office in Connecticut, law enforcement agencies had been investigating 14 bank and credit union robberies and a handful of attempted robberies in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and New Hampshire.
Investigators believe the robberies, which occurred between September 2021 and August 2022, were committed by the same person.
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Customers sit at the slot machines inside the MGM Springfield Casino in Springfield, Massachusetts.
(Nathan Klima for The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
Red Bull energy drink cans seen in a Target hypermarket.
(Alex Tai/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
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During one of the robberies in Connecticut, Taylor Dziczek, 30, approached a bank teller, brandished a firearm and said, “Give me all the money,” the statement said. And he added: “Don’t be a hero.”
Once he handed over the cash, he dumped the paper money wrappers inside the bank and fled, authorities said. The police collected the abandoned packages as evidence.
Dziczek’s abandoned wrappers ended up being the fatal flaw that led to his downfall and eventual arrest.
In May, FBI agents observed Dziczek at the MGM casino in Springfield, Massachusetts, and obtained a can of Red Bull that he had been seen drinking, authorities said.
A DNA analysis of the straw in the Red Bull can was compared to DNA evidence from money wrappers left at the Connecticut bank, federal officials said.
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Dziczek was arrested on December 1 and has been charged with bank robbery, a charge with a maximum sentence of 20 years, according to authorities. The investigation is ongoing and is being conducted by more than a dozen New England police departments in coordination with the FBI, authorities said.