The Americana at Brand shopping center in Glendale, Calif., near Los Angeles, was locked down for several hours Monday afternoon after a suspected armed robber used the mall parking garage to hide from police.
A suspect in the robbery of a Glendale liquor store led police on a high-speed car chase that ended at the shopping center when a getaway car crashed near a side entrance to the mall.
The suspect fled on foot into the center’s multi-story parking garage, where he hid in a stairwell and managed to avoid capture for about two hours until SWAT team closed in and arrested him. The episode was the latest criminal incident in a Los Angeles-area mall. The Tiffany & Co. store at Westfield’s Century City mall was the target of a smash-and-grab heist on Jan. 19, when masked suspects carrying guns entered the store moments before closing and used sledgehammers to smash display cases before fleeing with an undisclosed amount of jewelry.