SPRINGFIELD — The robbery of a post office branch that sparked an intensive search for three suspects Wednesday turned out to be a hoax by an employee and his sister, who were attempting to cover their tracks after stealing the money themselves, police said Thursday.

Springfield police and Bay County Sheriff’s deputies were called to the post office branch in Springfield Plaza , where 20-year-old clerk David Allen Rice Jr. claimed he’d been robbed at gunpoint by a woman and two men. Law enforcement began a store-by-store search for the three non-existent robbers after an employee in a store in the same building reported hearing unusual noises in the ceiling, which led police to believe they might have been hiding in the ceiling.

What actually happened, police said, is Rice took money himself and gave it to his sister, Courtney Diane Goines, 20, who hid the money at their home while Rice called police with the made up robbery report. Police recovered some, perhaps all, of the money at their home…

via Police: Post office robbery was a hoax – Crime/Public Safety – The News Herald.

SPRINGFIELD — Police and deputies surrounded a strip mall Wednesday afternoon searching for three people who robbed the Springfield branch of the United States Post Office of an undetermined amount of cash.

No one was hurt when three people, at least one of whom was a woman, donned masks and robbed the post office of an undisclosed amount of cash, said Springfield Police Chief Philip Thorne. At least one of the robbers carried a silver handgun during the robbery, and police believed initially the robbers might have taken hostages, but that possibility was quickly ruled out, Thorne said.

A lawman posted on the roof of the building as a crowd of onlookers watched from the parking lot below. Police and deputies with rifles and tactical gear led a K-9 deputy from the Bay County Sheriff’s Office on a store-by-store search of every nook, cranny and crawlspace before they determined the suspects no longer were at the scene around 6:30 p.m.

Police seek post office robbers //