You could call it a case of being in the right place at the right time -- an off-duty Montgomery County police officer was in a bank's drive-thru line when a robbery occurred inside the branch.
Officer William Morrison was in his marked patrol car when he saw a teller at the M&T Bank at 9801 Main Street in Damascus acting strangely Thursday morning. He saw the robbery in progress and confronted the suspect as soon as he exited the bank, police say.
The suspect took off on foot across Woodfield Road toward the parking lot of the Damascus Library. The accused robber tried to get into his accomplice's waiting vehicle, but the vehicle quickly left. Morrison pulled the vehicle over a short distance away and arrested the driver. Additional units summoned by the officer found the other suspect in a wooded area behind the library.
Both John Conley Laforce, 42, and Benjamin Edward Hansberger, 23, are charged with robbery. Police say Laforce was driving the getaway car while Hansberger committed the robbery.
Hansberger was also charged with a May 17 robbery at the same branch.