Texas man sentenced to prison for intentionally damaging ATMs, robbing repair technicians

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KEY TAKEAWAYS

Texas man Jawuan Donte Thomas was sentenced to nearly five years in federal prison for bank robbery.
Thomas and co-conspirators intentionally damaged ATMs to rob repair technicians in Utah and Ohio.
He will serve 57 months in prison, with three years of probation, and is ordered to pay $205,080 restitution.

SALT LAKE CITY — A Texas man who attempted to burglarize an ATM in Utah by intentionally damaging the machine then threatening a repair technician was sentenced last week to almost five years in federal prison.

Jawuan Donte Thomas, 24, was arrested in Utah in December 2024 after he attempted to rob an ATM at a Wells Fargo in Draper.

Federal prosecutors said Thomas and two co-conspirators had devised a scheme where they would damage an ATM so a repair technician was called and then use intimidation to steal the money from the technician.

On Dec. 17, 2024, police received a report from a Wells Fargo Bank in Riverton that one of its ATMs had been "intentionally damaged and jammed," Thomas' indictment says. Detectives learned a different ATM at a Draper Wells Fargo had also been damaged in the same way.

"My co-conspirators and I jammed the ATM, which we knew would cause the machine to malfunction and require Wells Fargo to call a technician to repair it," Thomas said in his plea agreement.

Through surveillance footage from the Riverton bank, police identified a suspect vehicle and located it at the Draper bank a few hours later. According to the charges, FBI agents were staged near the ATM anticipating a potential robbery and arrested Thomas, who was armed with a screwdriver, when he approached the technician.

"This attempted ATM robbery put an innocent technician's life at risk, showing Mr. Thomas' total disregard for human safety," said Salt Lake City FBI special agent in charge Robert Bohls.

Thomas pleaded guilty in the District of Utah to attempted bank robbery on June 26, 2025. But in December, his sentencing was postponed due to him being charged with bank robbery in a case in Ohio where he and two others successfully burglarized an ATM of more than $200,000 through the same strategy he employed in Utah.

The Ohio federal case was transferred to Utah in March when Thomas expressed his intent to plead guilty "in the District of Utah, in which I am physically present," court documents state. He then pleaded guilty to bank robbery during a hearing on May 12.

On Thursday, July 9, Thomas was sentenced for both cases. In the Utah attempted robbery, he received 41 months in prison. For the case that was transferred from Ohio, he was sentenced to 57 months in prison plus three years of probation.

The two sentences will be served concurrently in a Texas federal prison to allow for family visitation, according to court documents. Thomas is also ordered to pay $205,080 in joint restitution with his two co-defendants whose cases are still pending in Ohio federal court.

"Thomas's scheme to jam the ATM and confront the repairperson placed the ATM technician at great risk. I am grateful for the quick thinking, decisive actions and strong coordination of our law enforcement partners, whose efforts prevented this robbery from escalating," said U.S. Attorney Melissa Holyoak of the District of Utah.

This isn't the first case in Utah where a bank was robbed through an intentionally damaged ATM.

In September 2024, six people disabled an ATM at the Mountain America Credit Union in Taylorsville then pushed a repair technician to the ground before stealing $200,000 from a cash box in the machine.

The group members were all arrested at a rest stop in Iron County. All six were indicted in federal court on charges of robbing a credit union.

Jevaunte Reese, 33, of Houston, pleaded guilty in March to credit union robbery. He was sentenced last month to five years in prison, with credit for time served, plus three years of probation. Reese was the final defendant to be sentenced in the case.

Co-defendant Calvin Brantley was sentenced in 2025 to the same term as Reese. The other co-defendants — Lashawn Charleswell, Harold Oliver and Tiras Jack got four years, 46 months and 41 months in prison, respectively. Each of them will also serve three years on probation, according to court documents. Keaira Woods had her charge dismissed in April.

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