The News-Ledger
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — The alleged voices in Jason A. Church’s head apparently have a conscience.
Police say the man had no sooner robbed a Springfield convenience store this morning than he was on the phone reporting the crime to authorities.
“He said that he had just robbed the Go Convenience store because the voices in his head told him to,” said Springfield police Lt. Scott Leven. “They also told him to apparently turn himself in.”
Church, 30, was charged with first-degree robbery and armed criminal action in connection with the crime this afternoon.
A probable cause document used to charge the man alleges Church entered the convenience store, 811 E. Division St., at 6:13 a.m.
Church approached the ATM machine but left when clerk Doug Austin told him it was out of order, the document says.
The man allegedly returned a short time later, this time pouring a cup of coffee and bringing it to the register.
“Austin asked the male if he could get him anything else (to) which the male replied, ‘All the money in the register,” the document says. “The male was holding a broken beer bottle in his hand and pointing the broken end at Austin.”
Church allegedly walked behind the counter and, making the clerk open the cash register, took $75. He fled in a maroon Oldsmobile Cutlass.
“A short time later,” the statement says, Church called 911 from a pay phone at a nearby Brown Derby, 701 W. Commercial St.
He allegedly told a dispatcher the voices in his head had ordered him to rob the store, and he was arrested a short time later.
Police found $65 on the floorboard of Church’s car, which officers believe he lives out of.
The man also might stay with his parents in Ozark, Leven said.
He was in the Greene County Jail on a $40,000 bond this afternoon.
Copyright 2008 The News-Ledger