2 men plead guilty to $2M armored car robbery

ST. LOUIS -- Two St. Louis men have pleaded guilty to the $2 million robbery of an armored car, an inside job believed to have been one of the biggest cash heists ever in the city, federal prosecutors said Thursday.

Charles Johnson, 34, pleaded guilty Thursday, and Shayne Kier Jones, 30, pleaded guilty Tuesday to federal conspiracy charges. Both men will be sentenced in March.

Jones worked for Dunbar Armored Car Co. and told authorities he was threatened into participating in the robbery.

The crime happened April 4. Jones stopped at a gas station, pretending to be lost, the federal prosecutor's office in St. Louis said. When he got out of the truck, Johnson and another man rushed him and demanded money.

Court documents show Jones obliged, throwing bags of money out the back door of the armored truck to Johnson and the other man.

They put the money in a white car and drove away with more than $2 million, according to court documents.

Johnson and Jones were arrested days later, but more than half of the stolen money remains missing, a spokeswoman for the federal prosecutor's office said.

The third suspect has not been arrested.