NJ bank and restaurant robber who stole more than $59K heads to prison

A North Bergen man who had made off with more than $59,100 from robbing several banks and restaurants before he was caught in a final failed hold up was sentenced this week to 30 years in prison.

Gary Bohanan, 47, pleaded guilty almost two years ago to the heists he committed with three other accomplices in Bergen and Hudson counties.

Two of those accomplices also have been sentenced while a third died before she could be prosecuted.

Federal prosecutors said Bohanan was involved in the following robberies:

— July 10, 2013, robbery of a North Bergen McDonald's. Bohanan and Ramon Lopez, 25, of Union City, armed with guns and faces covered by masks, demanded money from employees and took $1,600 from the cash registers. Josephine Chenet, of North Bergen at the time, drove them away.

— July 18, 2013, robbery of Le Chateau restaurant in West New York. All three along with Angel Feliu, 22, of North Bergen, waited for the restaurant to close and followed the last employee home. They robbed her at gunpoint and took $6,000 in restaurant proceeds.

— July 22, 2013, robbery of a Sovereign Bank in Secaucus. Bohanan and Feliu, wearing latex gloves and masks, held up the bank at gunpoint,  emptied two drawers of money into a black bag and made off with $21,96. The loot also was shared with Chenet and Lopez.

The robbers were finally caught days later on July 26, 2013, after they held up a TD Bank in Fairview. Bohanan and Feliu went into the bank. Prosecutors say a security captured Feliu's face before he put on his mask.

The two were armed with a knife and air pistol.

After they fled from the bank on foot, they were followed by people in the bank.

Bohanan used his air pistol to carjack a van, but crashed it a short while later. He ran from the van, but the people who had followed him pointed him out to police hiding under a parked truck.

Feliu had been driven away by Chenet, but eventually got out of the car and tried to flee on foot through a cemetery before he was caught.

Feliu was sentenced last year to 46 months in prison while Lopez was sentenced to 47 months.

Chenet died June 22, 2014.

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