SEX: Male
RACE: White
HEIGHT: 5’8”-5’10”
WEIGHT: 180-230 lbs.
EYES: Unknown
HAIR: Dark, graying (straight, medium length)
The FBI has arrested a man they are now saying is responsible for committing between 37 and 40 bank robberies in Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee and Kentucky. On Tuesday, May 1st, 2007, 43-year-old William E. Cobb of Cottageville, South Carolina, was taken into custody. Cobb was identified as a possible suspect after he was pulled at a traffic stop for an unrelated offense. An officer from the Summerville Police Department in South Carolina recognized that Cobb may have committed a bank robbery and notified the FBI. The most recently reported incident happened on March 29th, 2007 where Cobb is accused of robbing the Liberty Savings Bank in Bluffton, South Carolina.
The string of robberies started back in October 2005. In every case, the man who authorities had coined the “Eastern Seaboard Robber,” would walk into a bank and hand a note to a teller indicating he had a weapon and was demanding cash. Witnesses said the suspect would peer through the bank’s windows before committing the robberies.
The suspect would wear a baseball hat, sometimes one that was camouflaged, and a gold watch on his left wrist. Sometimes he wore a bandage around his right forearm, to possibly cover a tattoo.
On June 20th, 2006, the robber made his way to Cary, North Carolina. He entered the bank, handed a note to the teller and walked out with an undisclosed amount of cash. Authorities say both Raleigh and Fayetteville also reported robberies on the same day. After viewing surveillance photos of the incident in Cary, both Raleigh and Fayetteville confirmed it was the same suspect who carried out the robberies in their locations.
