A serial robber who struck two separate Title Max stores in Smyrna – amongst other companies in various locations in Metro Atlanta – was sentenced recently to 20 years in federal prison for his crimes.
According to an article by Coosa Valley News, Avery Frazier robbed the employees of a Title Max in Smyrna on May 20, 2014 while brandishing a firearm. Just five months later, Frazier struck a different Title Max in Smyrna while brandishing a firearm. On Oct. 7, 2014, he told the employees that they had to go into a back room of the store and stay in the room if they wanted to see their families again.
Frazier was also charged in a series of violent armed robberies of title loan stores in Rockdale County.
“According to U.S. Attorney Horn, the charges and other information presented in court: Between 2013 and 2014, 34 robberies of title loan stores occurred in different areas of the metropolitan Atlanta area. In each, the robber had a similar method of operation. He would wear a mask, enter a title loan store brandishing a firearm at employees, and demand the business’s cash,” the article reads. “He would then force employees to move to the rear of the store. Eventually, he started forcing the employees to remain in a bathroom or storage room until he left. The robber also threatened store employees by telling them at gunpoint that they must follow his directions or risk never seeing their families again.”
A quick police response helped identify his vehicle and, ultimately, led to his arrest.
“The FBI is proud of the role that it played in bringing Mr. Frazier forward for federal prosecution. The lengthy prison sentence in this case is reflective of the serious nature of the repeated violent robberies committed and the emotional victimization left in his wake,” J. Britt Johnson, Special Agent in Charge, FBI Atlanta Field Office is quoted as saying in the article.
In early 2014, local law enforcement officers from several different Atlanta-metro police departments formed a task force and began working with the FBI to identify the robber.
“On October 30, 2014, a local Conyers Police Department officer, who was responding to a call for assistance at a different location, captured Frazier’s license plate as Frazier fled the scene of a robbery at the Title Bucks store in Conyers, Georgia,” the article reads. “After further investigation and information sharing among the FBI and local police departments, Frazier was identified as the suspect in the series of armed robberies. Conyers Police Department officers obtained a warrant for his arrest, and Frazier was arrested on that warrant on November 5, 2014.”
On April 19, 2016, Frazier pled guilty to four armed commercial robberies. The two Title Max robberies in Smyrna and:
- February 17, 2014 – Frazier robbed the employees of the Georgia Auto Pawn in Conyers, Georgia, while brandishing a firearm.
- October 30, 2014 – Frazier robbed the employees of a Title Bucks in Conyers, Georgia, while brandishing a firearm. During the robbery, Frazier rounded up two employees and a customer who was present in the store at gunpoint. Brandishing the gun at them, he made them give him the day’s deposit of cash. He then ordered the three victims at gunpoint to go into a back room of the store and to wait ten minutes. He shut them in the room and left the store with the cash. It was in leaving this robbery that Frazier’s license plate was picked up by a local Conyers officer’s license plate reader.
Avery Frazier, 49, of Douglasville, Georgia, was sentenced to 20 years in prison to be followed by three years of supervised release, and restitution of $14,218.
