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SALT LAKE CITY -- A man wanted for committing two aggravated bank robberies and an armed carjacking in the past 36 hours was arrested Wednesday morning.
Police ultimately found 29-year-old William Mossman in the parking lot behind a Salt Lake City apartment building near 800 East and 300 South. He was asleep in the car he had stolen at gunpoint Monday night from 83-year-old K. Robison.
After Mossman's arrest, police took several bags of evidence back to the police station. They then turned the vehicle back over to the Robison.
"He walked right up to me and put the gun in my face, and I reached up and took hold of the barrel and pushed it off the side. And I said, ‘I'm not going to give you the keys,'" 83-year-old K. Robison said.
Robison told KSL News he was "tickled" about the arrest and getting his car back. He also recalled Monday's terrifying experience of having the car stolen from him.
When Robison came out of a movie at Jordan Commons in Sandy Monday night, Mossman demanded the keys to his white Toyota Camry and shoved the end of a shotgun in Robison's face.
"He says, ‘Give me the keys, I'm taking the car,'" Robison said. "And I said, ‘You're what?'"
Robison didn't back down.
"He walked right up to me and put the gun in my face, and I reached up and took hold of the barrel and pushed it off the side. And I said, ‘I'm not going to give you the keys,'" Robison said. "So he tried to reach in my pocket and get them, and we fought a little bit, and I kicked him as hard as I could in the leg. And Millie, my partner, she had a hold of the gun. And he jerked back real hard and freed the gun, and he aimed it up at the roof and fired a shot."
That's when Robison handed over the keys.
"I didn't want to die for the car," he said.
Officers say the Camry was the vehicle used in two armed bank robberies earlier this week.
Police say their investigation led them to Mossman, but a situation Wednesday morning at an apartment complex on the west side of Salt Lake City helped.
Around 4 a.m., dispatch received a call from a woman saying her life was being threatened by a man, and that the man was coming to her apartment right then to kill her.
"When our officers showed up, they didn't know he was a suspect in the robbery," said Salt Lake City police Detective Pat Wilkinson. "He showed up on scene in a white car, in this car, and then fled. Our officers didn't pursue him because, at the time, they didn't know he was wanted in connection with the aggravated robberies."
Wilkinson says while investigators were talking with the victim, she confirmed that the man who had just fled the apartment was Mossman. Police then received information that he may be hiding out at the apartment building where he was ultimately found.
Mossman is being questioned by Salt Lake City police, Sandy police and the FBI. He is expected to be booked on federal charges sometime Wednesday afternoon.
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Story compiled with contributions from Shara Park and Anne Forester.
