LOS ANGELES -- A fugitive known as the 'Coin Box Bandit,' who stole an estimated half-million dollars from pay telephones across the nation, agreed Friday to return to his home state of Ohio to 'face the music.'
James Clark, 49, waived his right to fight extradition and was to be picked up by Ohio authorities before Sept. 19, his attorney, Paul Potter, said following a brief hearing in Municipal Court.
Clark, with collar-length gray hair and a gray goatee, acknowledged during the hearing that he is the man named in a November 1985 arrest warrant issued in the Akron, Ohio, area.
FBI agents arrested Potter Aug. 26 at his home in Buena Park, alleging he was the so-called Coin Box Bandit, wanted for breaking into pay telephones in several states since at least 1985. Losses to the telephone companies were estimated as high as $500,000.
The Coin Box Bandit was featured twice on the Fox Television Network show, 'America's Most Wanted.'
'He's a very nice man. He realizes he's in a great deal of trouble. He wants to go back to Ohio and have this thing played out,' Potter said.
'It's time to go back and face the music.'
Federal charges of interstate flight to avoid prosecution were dropped at an earlier court appearance and state fugitive charges will be dismissed when Clark is returned to Ohio, Potter said.
The attorney said he hoped Clark's prosecution could be combined in Ohio, in order to avoid a chain of trials and jail terms. 'I'd hate to see him get dragged around to several states, do time in one and then go on to the next,' he said.
Authorities said Clark, a former machinist, developed a sophisticated device to unlock the coin boxes on pay telephones. Beginning in Akron, he allegedly raided telephones all across the West and Southwest.
The Coin Box Bandit favored locales of major sporting events or other large gatherings that increased his chances for a large take and provided crowds he could blend into, authorities said.
Potter, who said he did not know how long Clark had lived in Southern California, called his client a 'garage inventor.'
'He's an American tinkerer,' Potter said.
