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WARREN — A customer who thwarted a bank robbery in Warren Sept. 21 when he used a concealed pistol to shoot the suspect will not face criminal charges, police said after reviewing the facts of the case with Macomb County prosecutors.
The suspect, 43-year-old Henry Houston Mann, of Ypsilanti, remains in federal custody following medical treatment and has been named in a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court.
Mann is accused of robbing the Citizens Bank on Van Dyke, north of Nine Mile Road, where he allegedly used a loaded handgun to intimidate several employees and a customer identified only as a 60-year-old autoworker from Warren.
Detective Sgt. Stephen Mills, of the Warren Police Department, said the unnamed customer emerged from a restroom during the robbery and was ordered by the suspect into a corner of the bank, along with the employees.
“The guy (the suspect) actually physically assaulted him. The victim comes out of the bathroom, and he exits into the lobby area of the bank itself,” Mills said. “The suspect now makes this decision. He pulls his gun out and points it right into (the customer’s) face. The gun is literally inches from his face. He grabs him and pushes him into a corner.”
The customer reportedly told police that he feared for his safety and that of bank employees.
“He just thought that guy was going to do something bad to them,” Mills said. “It was either ‘get or get got,’ is how he said it.”
Mills said the customer fired eight shots from a 9 mm handgun that had been concealed as Mann was making his way toward the door with an undisclosed amount of cash. Mann was reportedly hit in both arms and entered the vestibule of the bank, where he dropped a bag of money and a loaded weapon when he was hit in the leg by a bullet.
Bullets fired by the customer could reportedly be seen on surveillance video breaking the glass windows near the vestibule.
Warren police arriving at the scene took Mann into custody after he collapsed outside the bank.
According to the complaint filed in federal court, Mann was convicted in 1989 on charges of second-degree murder and assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder.
His court-appointed criminal defense attorney could not be reached for comment by press
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