Suspects in $1.6 mil. robbery arrested

Monday, April 12, 1999 | 11:14 a.m.

Metro Police may have finally collared three men wanted in connection with a 1997 robbery that netted $1.6 million from a Las Vegas coin company, but they had to go all the way to New Mexico to do it.

Richard Alan Gonce, 59, and Fain T. Gonce, 63, were arrested Thursday in southwest New Mexico for a Dec. 28, 1997, armed robbery of United Coin Machine Co., police said.

The brothers were arrested at their trailer off Route 60 near the Gila National Forest by New Mexico state police and Metro detectives.

A third suspect, Eric Zessman, was arrested Thursday in Pahrump, police said.

Police confiscated about $32,000 in cash, gold and silver coins from the brothers' trailer. Property deeds and receipts for $50,000 in mutual funds and other items were also taken by police.

About 30 weapons, including a .20-gauge shotgun and a 9mm semiautomatic pistol that may have been used in the robbery also were confiscated.

The 1997 robbery was carried out by two men in ski masks and jumpsuits, whom police believe were the Gonce brothers, and a driver, believed to be Zessman.

The robbery took place about 12:30 a.m. on Dec. 28. Two men armed with guns approached three United Coin workers who were outside smoking and forced them back into the building, where one of the gunmen stood watch while the other stuffed cash into duffle bags.

On Friday the brothers waived extradition in a Magistrate Court in Reserve, N.M., where they will be held until Metro detectives pick them up.

The brothers through Fain Gonce's wife, Andrea Jane Gonce, had filed a deed for the purchase of 127 acres of land 150 miles southwest of Albuquerque, on May 22, 1998, according to Catron County records.

The brothers were building a log cabin on the property, which was worth about $44,000 according to county records.