PORTLAND, OR (KPTV) -
There were terrifying moments inside a Key Bank in northeast Portland Monday as police said a robber stormed in with a handgun.
Just before 4 p.m. Monday, they say the armed man walked in and placed a box near a teller, claiming it was a bomb.
He pointed his gun at several customers and bank workers, then demanded cash.
"I'm shocked. I come here every day," Mary Stanich, who lives nearby, said.
Police say as the man tried to make his getaway, he approached a woman and told her to give him her SUV.
She pleaded with the man not to take it because she had her two kids inside.
The man wouldn't take no for an answer, so he held her at gunpoint, walked out to the parking lot and forced her kids out of the SUV.
He then took off in her Toyota Four Runner.
"I'd be petrified if I was her. My God, not only for herself but for her kids. It's a very scary thing," Stanich said.
By the time police arrived, the man was gone, but the box he claimed to be a bomb was still inside.
The explosives disposal unit suited up and about an hour later, determined the box was nothing dangerous.
"Honestly it kind of spooked me. Somebody could've gotten killed in the process, you know what I mean? Good thing it didn't happen. Thank God for that," Victor Collins, who also lives nearby, said.
Shortly after, bank workers and customers were allowed back inside to gather their belongings and go home.
We caught up with the woman who had her car stolen, but she didn't want to do an interview.
A family member later told us off-camera that the two kids are doing fine and were not hurt.
"You always want to protect your kids over yourself. ‘Take me, leave them. Whatever you do, don't hurt my children,' that kind of thing. You know, that's what a mother does," Stanich said.
The getaway car is a white 1997 Toyota Four Runner with Oregon license plates 110 CYU.
The armed robber is a white man in his 50s.
He was last seen wearing a hat and a green shirt with the word "dare" on the front.
Police believe he has a sleeve-style tattoo on his right arm.
If you have any information, call 911.
Copyright 2012 KPTV (Meredith Corporation). All rights reserved.
