Hills Robbery Suspect Caught

Article taken from The Elyria Chronicle Telegram February 3, 1965.

LORAIN - The fifth person being sought in the Hills Department Store armed robbery Dec. 12 was apprehended lastnight in Charleston, S.C., Police Chief Maurice Mumford announced.

Stephen Fields, who had home addresses in Portsmouth Ohio, Denver, and Georgia, as picked up by Charleston authorities and turned over to the Federal Bureau of Investigations.

Mumford said that Fields will be arraigned in federal court on a fugitive warrant. The chief says he does not know when Fields will be transferred to Lorain.

Three of the other four suspects in the holdup pleaded guilty and were sentenced to prison terms in Lorain County Common Pleas Court Monday. They were Jesse Cline, 24, Ringgold, Ga., his brother Ronnie, 20, Chattanooga, Tenn., and Alice Stewart, 32, Commerce City, Colo. The fourth suspect, Fields' brother James, 32, entered a plea of innocent to the armed robbery charge. His case was set for trial Monday. The suspects were charged with taking $16,785 cash and more than $1,000 in checks from the Hills Department Store. They made their getaway after a "stand-off shooting spree" with Lorain Police Lt. George Maiden, who was working as an off-duty guard at the time.