MORGANTOWN — A Pennsylvania man in jail for a Preston County bank robbery pleaded guilty to robbing a Monongalia County bank in 2018.
Daryl R. Waychoff, 57, pleaded guilty to first-degree robbery Tuesday. Judge Susan Tucker accepted his plea and dismissed a count of fleeing from an officer, which was part of the plea agreement.
Waychoff was arrested Oct. 10, 2019, after he robbed Clear Mountain Bank in Bruceton Mills, Monongalia County Prosecutor Perri DeChristopher said. While attempting to escape that robbery, he entered Mon County, crashed near the Pennsylvania state line, and was arrested.
Monongalia County Sheriff’s detectives discovered the motorcycle he used in the Preston robbery matched one used in a robbery at the Chaplin Road First United Bank, DeChristopher said. Detectives matched the orange and black Suzuki with video footage, and members of Waychoff’s family confirmed it was him during a search of his Pennsylvania home.
Waychoff said he approached the teller, “threatened that I had a gun in my bag, which I did not, and that I needed cash and for her to just hand me cash and she did.” He escaped with $1,350. The Clear Mountain Bank score was $2,175 and Waychoff said he thinks there was about $2,700 from a bank robbery in White Hall in 2017 for which he has not yet pleaded guilty.
“Bank robbery is not lucrative,” DeChristopher said.
Waychoff was sentenced to serve 10-20 years and 10-25 years last week after pleading guilty to bank robbery-related charges in Preston County, his attorney, Brandon Shumaker said.
Shumaker requested Tucker sentence him on the spot, and Waychoff said he waived his right to a pre-sentence investigation report because the one in Preston was completed three weeks ago and “it would be the same.”
Shumaker said Waychoff was prepared to spend time in prison and asked Tucker to run the sentence at the same time as his Preston County sentences. He said Marion County was likely to do the same down the line. Tucker said part of her consideration in running a sentence concurrent instead consecutively is if the crimes are related. She noted there was about a year between each robbery, making them separate events.
The underlying motive for all the robberies was similar, Shumaker said. Waychoff was trying to pay for his sick wife’s health care. Despite being employed — Waychoff said he worked for a fencing company for 4 years and Jimmy John’s for 3 years before that — he couldn’t earn enough to pay all the bills.
Waychoff said his wife of 38 years had a valve replacement in her heart in 2016. She never recovered from surgery, the valve got infected, and in 2017 the doctor wanted to replace it. The insurance companies needed 30 days to decide if they could approve that kind of surgery again, but doctors said it needed done immediately.
It was expensive and Waychoff “had the surgery done anyways” but ultimately, she died in January 2019, he said. He started crying after sharing the story.
Tucker decided to have Monongalia County probation do an update of the Preston County PSI, which was not available at Tuesday’s hearing, and scheduled a sentencing in three weeks.
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