Amateur football team owner and player allegedly rob bank together to pay debts, guard killed in one heist

Federal prosecutors are considering the death penalty against the owner of an amateur football team and one of his players after a guard died when the two allegedly robbed a bank.

On June 11 just after 1 p.m., Hailey Gist-Holden, 26, the owner of the Chicago-based amateur football team Illini Panthers, and one of his players, James Anthony King, allegedly robbed First Midwest Bank in Gary, Indiana, according to a 17-page affidavit obtained by FrontPageDetectives.

Surveillance footage “showed two males dressed in all black” emerge from the woods, the affidavit states, in part. “As the suspects approached the bank, the bank’s security guard, Richard Castellana, was walking on the bank’s front sidewalk.”

The security guard, a retired Cook County Sheriff’s deputy who was armed with a handgun, “did not confront the suspects and it appears as if Castellana did not even see them before he was shot” in the face, according to the affidavit. Castellana died at the scene.

One of the suspects then allegedly entered the bank and held up tellers while the second “positioned himself at the front door of the bank and fired several rounds into the bank from a rifle,” the affidavit states.

After the robbery, the pair fled into woods. According to the affidavit, officers searching the area located King, and he surrendered. Police reportedly found a.40 caliber Glock Model 22 handgun as well as $9,080 cash fastened with paperclips in a backpack not far away.

Gist-Holden managed to escape.

King allegedly confessed to participating in the robbery and claimed his coach, Gist-Holden, shot the guard, according to the affidavit.

On June 18, Gist-Holden was captured in Atlanta, Georgia, after he refused to pull over for police and led them on a chase at speeds that reached 140 m.p.h., the affidavit states.

At the time of the robbery, Gist-Holden was in arears on rent for his Gary home and he owed money to a Downers Grove hotel where his team was lodged.

Gisten-Holden and King both face charges of armed bank robbery, using a firearm during a robbery, and causing death.