A Lubbock County grand jury on Tuesday indicted three men for armed robbery. Court records said on August 28, two of the three posed as police officers and robbed the Highway 87 game room south of Lubbock.
Officers were called to the game room for the report of two men who got inside the business by showing badges and claiming they were police officers. They took more than $2,000 cash and other items according to court records.
One of the suspects pulled a gun during the robbery and pointed it at an employee of the game room, according to court records.
Sheriff’s Deputies later identified the two suspects as Christopher Payne, 39, and Joshua Gilder, 34. However, shortly after the robbery, deputies also interviewed a game room employee, Javier Rodriguez, 31, in jail. Rodriguez had been arrested for an unrelated charge.
Under questioning, Rodriguez confessed to having prior knowledge of the robbery, and he admitted he was the one to let the other two suspects in.
Rodriguez confessed that he felt anger against his employer for being unsympathetic about a customer who was killed in a previous incident. Court records did not specify which incident but two weeks prior to the robbery, there was a deadly pedestrian accident near the game room.
Rodriguez told investigators he was approached by one of the other suspects with the idea of a robbery, but he denied there was a plan to split the proceeds with him.
Gilder was arrested on October 11. Payne was arrested on October 14. All three defendants remained in the Lubbock County Detention Center as of Tuesday.
*Correction: Court records said a gun was displayed during the robbery. The original version of this story incorrectly described how the gun was pointed.