Crime & Safety
Back Door Bandit Pleads Guilty to Single Robbery Charge, Accused of 12 Robberies
The defendants, along with a teenage boy who was being prosecuted separately, were arrested in August in connection to the robbery at Smashburger on Prospect Avenue in La Jolla.
A man accused of involvement in more than a dozen armed holdups at restaurants and other businesses in Clairemont and La Jolla pleaded guilty Thursday to a single robbery charge.
Thomas Abel Nelson, 23, will be sentenced March 25.
Two co-defendants, Ryan Patrick Churchill, 23, and Duran Montiq Caldwell, 24, each face multiple counts of robbery and a conspiracy charge in connection with the "Backdoor Bandits" armed robbery series that occurred from May to August of last year. Their preliminary hearing was rescheduled to Feb. 26.
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The defendants, along with a teenage boy who was being prosecuted separately, were arrested in August during a traffic stop not far from the scene of an armed robbery at a Smashburger restaurant on Prospect Avenue in La Jolla.
San Diego police said that inside the defendants' car, officers found dark clothing, a black Airsoft semi-automatic replica handgun, a black backpack filled with cash and a cashbox from Smashburger.
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The "Backdoor Bandits" moniker stems from the way the thieves in the robbery series almost always entered businesses through a rear door.
—City News Service
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