By Fallan Patterson

Staff Writer

One suspect has been arrested in connection with Wednesday's armed robbery at the RBC Bank at 1818 John Young Parkway in Kissimmee.

Stanley Bernard Haugabook, 26, of Orlando, is being held without bond in the Osceola County Jail and is charged with armed robbery with a firearm, conspiracy to commit armed robbery with a firearm, fleeing and eluding law enforcement, resisting arrest without violence and violation of probation.

Haugabook was arrested shortly after the crime when a Kissimmee Police Department officer noticed the vehicle he was driving fit the description given by bank employees of the suspects' vehicle. The officer conducted a felony traffic stop on John Young Parkway near West Carroll Street and was able to link Haugabook to the robbery. It is 1.2 miles from the bank to the intersection where he was stopped.

Haugabook is suspected of being one of four masked black males who stormed the bank at noon Wednesday with assault rifles and other guns, demanding money.

According to the three-minute surveillance video, one suspect is seen jumping the counter to collect cash as the other three suspects controlled the employees, going as far as to force a female employee out of her office and to kneel on the foyer floor while someone pointed an assault rifle at her. The first suspect is then seen jumping back over the counter with a bag slung over his shoulder. The suspects then fled with an undisclosed amount of money.

Kissimmee police set up a perimeter and searched with K-9 units, during which time Highlands and Central Avenue elementary schools were placed on lockdown. Officers located two vehicles that appeared to be involved in the robbery, one of which was recently reported stolen from the Kissimmee area.

At least four employees were in the bank at the time of the robbery, one of which hid in a conference room to call police. No one was injured during the incident.

Kissimmee police said Thursday in a press release Haugabook is not cooperating with the investigation.

Haugabook is no stranger to law enforcement.

Haugabook served three years of a four-year sentence on robbery and kidnapping charges out of Orlando in 2005 in which he also received six years of probation, according to Ninth Judicial Circuit Court records.

Additionally, Haugabook was convicted on several aggravated battery charges in 2003, also in Orange County, including petit theft in 2004 and he has received various traffic citations.

The charges in connection to Wednesday's robbery were his first in Osceola County, according to court records.

Scott Carmean, executive director of the Veterans Tribute and Museum of Osceola County Museum of Military History, had just pulled into the bank's parking lot to deposit his paycheck at the RBC Bank when officers cut him off while responding to the robbery. Carmean said the parking lot was empty at the time he pulled in.

Officers yelled for him and another customer to run away from the bank as the police removed bulletproof vests from vehicles and drew guns on the bank's entrance, Carmean said, however the suspects had already fled.

Carmean, who uses this RBC location for the museum's banking, said he knows all the employees on a first-name basis and likes the bank because there is rarely a line and it is never crowded.

“I wouldn't have thought (the suspects) would get a lot of money there because it's so quiet,” he said.

While Carmean's vehicle was trapped within the police investigation for nearly two hours, he said the police appeared trained for such a situation.

“They did a really good job of protecting us if there had been any danger,” Carmean said.

Anyone with information about the crime or the suspects is asked to contact the Kissimmee Police Department’s Major Crimes Unit at 407-846-3333 by e-mail at seeitsayit@kissimmee.org or Crimeline at 1-800-423-TIPS (8477).