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What began as a seemingly ordinary day turned into a nightmare for pizza delivery driver Brian Wells.
Wells entered a PNC Bank with a bomb secured around his neck, part of a bizarre and deadly bank heist. This harrowing tale, which is the focus of Oxygen’s A Plan to Kill, saw Wells frantically racing against time in a desperate attempt to liberate himself from the lethal contraption.
Tragically, before he could complete the perilous scavenger hunt, law enforcement apprehended Wells. The bomb, still attached to him, detonated, fatally injuring him as it exploded through his chest.
Investigators, as they peeled back the layers of this puzzling case, uncovered what one described as a “maniacal” scheme that shocked even veteran detectives.
Retired FBI Special Agent Jerry Clark commented, “This plan just unfolded into this enormous, truly malevolent plot to kill.”
Delivery Driver Brian Wells Killed By Bomb After Robbing Bank
The bizarre story began on Aug. 28, 2003, when police received a call about a bank robbery in progress in Erie, Pennsylvania.
Police and FBI agents quickly descended on the scene and learned that a man had entered the bank wearing a bomb under his shirt.
After walking away with $8,700, the suspect—later identified as Wells—was seen in a McDonald’s parking lot before heading to the nearby eye glass store, where he was stopped by police.
“Immediately the guy said he was forced to wear the bomb and to do the robbery,” retired Pennsylvania State Police investigator David Gluth explained. “At that time, they backed away from him and started to set a perimeter up.”
By then, Clark arrived at the scene and interviewed Wells, who told him that he had been delivering two pizzas for Mama Mia’s Pizza when he was attacked by a group who instructed him to rob the bank and put the bomb around his neck.
As investigators waited for the local bomb squad to arrive, the device went off, killing Wells, who was sitting in the middle of the street with his hands cuffed behind him.
“I’ll never forget this: I watched his chest go down and it never came back up,” Clark recalled. “And I thought, ‘Oh my God, this is fatal.’ You know, this is just absolutely the worst thing I had seen.”
Was Brian Wells Involved in the Bank Robbery Plot?
As authorities tried to make sense of the disturbing chain of events, they spoke with the bank tellers, who told them that Wells had appeared “very cavalier” as he came in carrying a large black cane. At one point, he even picked up a lollipop at the counter, unwrapped it and began to eat it.
“The fact that he pulled out a lollipop while robbing the bank was such a psychology dichotomy for me,” Clark said. “How could you be that calm knowing that you had a live device around your neck?”
Given the behavior, investigators began to suspect that Wells may have had knowledge of the plan.
Investigators Unravel Details of Complex Scavenger Hunt Linked to Brian Wells’ Death
Authorities also recovered a nine-page, highly detailed letter that Wells had given to the bank teller, instructing her to give him $250,000 in cash—an amount far greater than the bank actually had on hand—or he’d detonate the bomb.
After getting less than $10,000, he walked out of the bank.
During a search of his vehicle, investigators recovered the cane and realized that it had been specially created to fire a 12-gauge shotgun round that was hidden inside.
They also found a canvas bag with the money and a series of notes.
“They were instructions to Mr. Wells to rob the bank as a bank hostage and then go on a series of stops like a scavenger hunt to unlock the collar around his neck,” Clark explained. “The first site was to go to the McDonald’s, which he did, into the flower bed, turn over a stone and receive another page of notes.”
Wells was then instructed to go to the parking lot of the eye glass store to find a fire hydrant, tie an orange ribbon around it to signal he’d gotten the money.
“Then someone was supposed to come by in a car and pick up the money,” investigative reporter Ed Palattella, who co-wrote the book Pizza Bomber, explained. “It never got to that point.”
With Wells now dead, investigators worked on the scavenger hunt on their own, which led them from one wooded location along the roadway to another by the McKean Township sign. Although they found a torn orange ribbon near the sign, there were no other instructions, making it impossible to know whether it was the final stop or if the masterminds intended for Wells to continue.
“It was just maniacal,” Clark said, “when you think about having a human being go to sites to try to save his own life.”
Who Was Brian Wells?
Investigators discovered that before the bank robbery, Wells had led a fairly simple life. Never married, the 46-year-old loved reality television and solving puzzles in the local newspaper, which had participants follow clues to track down a key to win a prize.
“That would show me that somebody knew Brian Wells,” Gluth said, “and purposely targeted him with the scavenger hunt in the notes.”
The cane and the bomb were so well-crafted that FBI behavioral analysts concluded that someone with experience working with tools likely created both. They also believed the suspect was likely a pack rat, highly intelligent and with a possible background in engineering.
Call About a Frozen Body Provides New Clue in Brian Wells’ Death
Investigators got an unexpected break in the case on Sept. 21, 2003 when Bill Rothstein called 911 to report he had a frozen body in a freezer in his garage. Rothstein told investigators that his friend Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong had gotten into a fight with her boyfriend James Roden and shot him.
Diehl-Armstrong had a violent past, once killing a boyfriend as he laid on the couch, but she was acquitted using a battered spouse defense.
Rothstein— a shop teacher whose home was cluttered with objects—admitted to helping her put the body in the freezer, but now wanted the help of police to get it out.
According to Clark, “This case just kept getting crazier and crazier.”
While searching his home, along with uncovering Roden’s body, investigators also found a suicide note seemingly written by Rothstein that included the line “This has nothing to do with the Wells case.”
The note triggered investigators’ suspicions that Rothstein could be involved, particularly after realizing that he lived across from the tower site where the pizzas had been delivered.
What Happened to Bill Rothstein?
Diehl-Armstrong and Rothstein were taken into custody in connection to Roden’s shooting. While Rothstein was willing to talk about Roden’s death, he insisted he had nothing to do with the bank robbery.
Rothstein pled guilty to abuse of a corpse and disposing of evidence, but Diehl-Armstrong was immediately declared incompetent to stand trial in Roden’s case, preventing authorities from being able to speak with her about Wells.
To complicate matters, Rothstein died of cancer in July 2004, taking whatever he knew with him to the grave.
Then, in January 2005, Diehl-Armstrong pleaded guilty but mentally ill in Roden’s death and was given a sentence of seven to 20 years in prison.
Behind bars, Diehl-Armstrong agreed to talk with investigators and pointed them to Ken Barnes, a known crack dealer connected to Wells through a mutual acquaintance.
Around the same time, a delivery driver came forward to say he had seen Rothstein and Diehl-Armstrong together at a pay phone at a convenience store near the PNC bank the day of the robbery. Barnes was also spotted on surveillance footage inside the store that day.
Ken Barnes Revealed Complex Plot to Earn $250,000, Kill Brian Wells
Then, in 2007, Barnes agreed to cooperate with authorities, explaining that Diehl-Armstrong had been hoping to take a hit out on her wealthy father to cash in on his inheritance.
Barnes told investigators that he agreed to kill the man in exchange for $250,000. To get the money, however, Rothstein and Diehl-Armstrong created a plot to rob the bank, using a patsy—and Wells fit the bill.
Wells agreed to participate in exchange for $5,000, but Clark said he was told the bomb would be fake.
“He was never going to survive because he would never had time to accomplish all those routes he was to do,” Clark said. “That bomb was just going to detonate wherever he was in that scavenger hunt. They tricked him, they duped him, they killed him and it was horrific what happened to him.”
Investigators believe that Roden was initially part of the scheme, but was killed when he stopped cooperating.
Barnes pled guilty to using a destructive device during a crime of violence and conspiracy to commit bank robbery. He was sentenced to 22.5 years and died in prison of cancer in 2019.
Diehl-Armstrong was convicted on charges of conspiracy to commit armed bank robbery, bank robbery and using a destructive device to commit robbery in November of 2010. She was sentenced to life in prison plus 30 years and died of cancer in 2017.