Haneytown man denies bank-robbery charges
Chad Atkinson, 30, still awaiting outcome of legal-aid application, court hears
A Haneytown man denied allegations Tuesday he tried to stick up an Oromocto bank branch armed with a pellet gun this summer.
Chad Atkinson, 30, of Farnham Road in Haneytown, appeared in Fredericton provincial court by telephone from jail Tuesday morning to answer to serious charges.
RCMP officers arrested him at the TD Bank branch on Onodaga Street Oromocto the afternoon of Aug. 30. There was a major armed police response at that location that day after authorities received a report of a robbery in progress.
Atkinson has been in custody since that time, and his case was back before court Tuesday.
The defendant elected Tuesday to be tried in provincial court and pleaded not guilty to attempting to rob the bank and TD employee Samson Adeyemo of cash, possessing a Crossman Arms Co. pellet gun for the purpose of committing an offence, carrying that pellet gun as a concealed weapon and breaching his probation.
The probation order in question was imposed May 30, just three months before the alleged robbery attempt.
Duty counsel Michael Mallory said Atkinson doesn’t have a defence lawyer yet but noted his legal-aid application is being processed. In fact, he said, he believed it was likely he was going to be assigned Atkinson’s file.
Judge Cameron Gunn set the case over to Oct. 23 to schedule trial dates and to allow time for the legal-aid process to unfold.
The RCMP reported in a Sept. 1 news release that a male suspect entered the bank at about 2:15 p.m. and demanded money, and he told staff he had a firearm in his backpack.
After receiving the report of the incident as it was happening, officers surrounded the bank branch. A suspect was arrested shortly thereafter without incident, the release said.
Don MacPherson can be contacted at ftonindependent@gmail.com.