Gallup man charged with Pilot robbery

By Leslie Wood
Staff writer

GALLUP — Authorities arrested a 30-year-old Gallup man in connection with the armed robbery of the Jamestown Pilot Travel Center early Monday morning.

Michael Griffith was booked into the McKinley County Adult Detention Center on charges of armed robbery and tampering with evidence, Sgt. Albert Benally of the McKinley County Sheriff’s Department, said.

Deputies were initially dispatched to the Pilot Travel Center — just off U.S. Interstate Highway 40 — in reference to a man who robbed the store at knife point and fled the location with an undisclosed amount of money at about 1 a.m. The suspect approached the store’s manager and demanded he hand over the business’s cash; however, no employees were harmed during the robbery.

The travel center’s employees provided authorities with a description of the suspect’s vehicle and its license plate number. Officers subsequently traced the license plate to Griffith and he was detained by city police officers while driving through the Gallup area.

Benally said authorities recovered some of the money that was taken from the travel center. As of midafternoon Monday, deputies were working to obtain a warrant to search Griffith’s vehicle for evidence related to the incident.

He said patrol officers gathered “intelligence” surrounding the case in quick manner and made the arrest possible. He also praised metropolitan dispatch employees for sending the appropriate information across police airways.

Investigators arrived at the Jamestown crime scene minutes after 1 a.m. and worked into the early afternoon hours on the case.

“The investigation is ongoing,” Benally said.