Man pleads guilty to robbing PNC bank
PITTSBURGH — A Beaver County man pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to the August robbery of a Cranberry Township PNC Bank.
Michael Ryan Neppach, 40, originally pleaded not guilty to the sole count of bank robbery when he was indicted in October.
At a hearing Wednesday before U.S. District Judge Nora Barry Fischer, Neppach, wearing a red Allegheny County Jail jumpsuit, admitted his guilt to the robbery of the PNC Bank on Route 19 near North Boundary Road.
State police apprehended Neppach a little more than 24 hours after a man wearing a green baseball cap, a long-sleeved camouflage shirt, black tennis shoes and clear plastic gloves entered the bank just before 4:50 p.m. Aug. 28. Using surveillance photos, investigators identified the man as Neppach.
According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey R. Bengel, investigators were able to identify Neppach because they were familiar with him from prior cases.
While in the bank, Bengel said, Neppach placed an envelope on the counter demanding the teller give him money. The teller recalled the note as reading, “I have a gun. No bait. No dye,” Bengel said.
In response to the note, the teller placed $1,394 on the counter, the state's criminal complaint reads.
At the hearing, Bengel said Neppach shed some of the clothing he was wearing during the robbery and threw it away. Investigators were able to recover the clothes from a white bag in the dumpster of a nearby GetGo after Neppach told investigators he had committed the crime, the prosecutor said.
Although they recovered the clothes used during the robbery, both Bengel and Neppach's defense attorney, Stanley Greenfield, said none of the money taken from the bank was recovered. Due to that, Bengel said the government would ask for $1,400 in restitution in addition to imprisonment for Neppach's punishment.
Bengel estimated the advisory sentencing guidelines would call for Neppach to spend 57 to 71 months in confinement due to the seriousness of the crime and his criminal history, which in Pennsylvania consists mostly of misdemeanor and summary offenses.
Federal prisoners are ineligible for parole.
Neppach was sent back to the Allegheny County Jail to await his sentencing, which is scheduled for April 15.
