San Diego police officers investigating an armed robbery of a La Mesa convenience store announce an arrest. The suspect is a man accused for a string of other crimes.
Michael Colace and Terri Franck face charges including robbery, residential burglary, auto theft, false imprisonment, kidnapping, elder abuse and assault with a deadly weapon according to officials.
La Mesa police officers say Colace, 46, held up a 7-Eleven store on Amaya Drive after 4:30 a.m. Thursday.
Officials said the suspect in the convenience store robbery wore a “Halloween mask of a bloody clown face” and pointed a handgun and mace at the clerk. La Mesa police say Colace committed the robbery and then left with some cash, cigarettes and lottery tickets.
Officials believe Colace then broke into a home on Odessa Avenue while the residents were sleeping. He allegedly stole a white 2005 Town and Country van and left the area.
Around 1 p.m. the same day, San Diego County sheriff’s deputies found the van inside the garage of a home on Crest Drive in Spring Valley.
Deputies believe Colace and an accomplice stole another vehicle – a 2000 white Nissan Frontier truck – from the garage at the Crest Drive home and left the Town and Country van parked in its place.
Local
The accomplice, later identified as 39-year-old Terri Franck, was also arrested Saturday with Colace in Carlsbad.
