(UPDATED) 'Man in Black' Suspect Linked to Local Invoice Scheme

A man arrested on Tuesday in St. Peter, MN, who could be connected with a string of Twin Cities robberies was convicted in 2005 of ripping off a St. Louis Park senior care facility.

The FBI is investigating whether Mark Edward Wetsch, 49, of Minneapolis, is the highly sought "Man in Black," who is suspected of robbing at least a half-dozen banks in the metro area in the past few months.

Wetsch was arrested after he was seen traveling in a vehicle suspected of being used in a robbery earlier that day at the Rolling Hills Bank, in Brewster, MN. He was charged with aggravated robbery, terroristic threats and theft—all felonies—Thursday in Nobles County District Court. He is being held in Nobles County custody on $300,000 bail.

Meanwhile, the FBI is still investigating any possible connections to earlier bank robberies that took place across the Twin Cities, said Kyle Loven, chief division counsel for the FBI’s Minneapolis office. Although the Nobles County District Court is handling Wetsch’s case for now, the FBI would charge him in federal court if appropriate.

“If we are able to bring charges federally, we fully intend to do so,” Loven said. “But that is something in the review side of the house.”

Wetsch was arrested after a witness observed a silver SUV leaving the scene of the Brewster robbery, Noble County Chief Deputy Chris Heinrichs wrote in the charging documents. St. Peter Police Detective Travis Sandland recalled that a silver SUV was possibly connected to a robbery in that community and went out to intercept the vehicle as it traveled between Brewster and St. Peter.

Sandland and another officer encountered Wetsch in a silver Ford Edge. They stopped the vehicle, and Wetsch denied being in Brewster that day. But the officers found the grip of a handgun and a large amount of loose currency and arrested him.

In a subsequent interview, Wetsch told Sandland that he left his Minneapolis home at 7 a.m. with the intention of robbing a bank, using his cell phone to look up banks in small towns, according to court documents. He said he first observed a Heron Lake bank but decided not to rob it because there were too many customers there.

He then went to the Brewster bank, demanded money from the teller and threatened her with a toy gun whose tip he’d colored black with a marker.

Wetsch estimated he fled with about $1,500. Investigators found about $3,400 in his vehicle—including 10 $10 “bait bills.” He said he planned to use the money from the robbery to travel to Africa the next day.

Wetsch said he had a bad feeling about the robbery and that he cut up his jacket while he was driving and threw it out of the vehicle.

He told Sandland that his first robbery was the easiest but they became more difficult as they went on. The charging documents do not include details about any of the other robberies.

If convicted, Wetsch could receive:

• Up to 20 years in prison and a $35,000 fine on the aggravated robbery charge,
• Up to a year and a day in prison and a $3,000 fine on the terroristic threats charge and
• Up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine on the theft charge.

Wetsch, the former nursing director of in St. Louis Park, was convicted in 2005 of taking $1.4 million from the senior care facility through an invoice scheme that occurred between September 1997 and January 2005.