SPRINGFIELD — Police and deputies surrounded a strip mall Wednesday afternoon searching for three people who robbed the Springfield branch of the United States Post Office of an undetermined amount of cash.
No one was hurt when three people, at least one of whom was a woman, donned masks and robbed the post office of an undisclosed amount of cash, said Springfield Police Chief Philip Thorne. At least one of the robbers carried a silver handgun during the robbery, and police believed initially the robbers might have taken hostages, but that possibility was quickly ruled out, Thorne said.
Not long after the robbery, which happened around 5 p.m., an employee at a video game store in the same building told police she heard unusual sounds coming from the ceiling of the store. That led police to believe the robbers might have hiding in the ceiling.
A lawman posted on the roof of the building as a crowd of onlookers watched from the parking lot below. Police and deputies with rifles and tactical gear led a K-9 deputy from the Bay County Sheriff’s Office on a store-by-store search of every nook, cranny and crawlspace before they determined the suspects no longer were at the scene around 6:30 p.m.
At that point, officials downgraded to “full investigative mode,” Thorne said. Springfield officers were securing the scene until the sheriff’s office crime scene unit arrived to process the post office for evidence that might lead to the robbers.
United States Marshals appeared briefly on the scene, and Thorne said he had left a message with the Federal Bureau of Investigation because the crime occurred at a federal office. He indicated the postal inspector had been contacted.
Thorne said it was too early to know what, if any, security measures the post office had.
He urged anyone with information about the robbery to contact the Springfield Police Department at 850-872-7545 or CrimeStoppers at 850-785-TIPS (8477).