395: Michael De La Pena – Santa Claus Armored Car Robbery and Murder

In this episode, Michael De La Pena reviews a case where he, as a rookie agent, was assigned to investigate two armored car robberies where $1.8 million was stolen. During one of the robberies of an armored vehicle in West Hartford, Conneticut, one of the subjects wore a full Santa Claus costume as a disguise.

Jeffrey Stenner, a former bank vice president and restaurant owner, was convicted of planning the robberies and the murder of 26-year-old accomplice and former Loomis armored car driver, Robert Schmidt. Prosecutors said Stenner believed Schmidt was talking too much about their crimes, so he had him killed.

Michael De La Pena received a letter from FBI Director William Sessions for his work on the case. He was interviewed about the case on the Oxygen Channel show, Buried in the Backyard, Season 6, Episode 8, titled Frozen Silent, available on demand.

He was previously interviewed on FBI Case File Review episode 247: Polygraph Examiner, Boston Marathon Bombing Associate.

Special Agent (Retired)

Michael De La Pena

7/1990 – 12/2019

Retired agent Michael De La Pena served in the FBI for nearly 30 years. Mike was assigned to the New Haven, San Juan, and Boston divisions, where he investigated bank robberies, armored car robberies, civil rights violations, fugitive matters, and terrorism cases. In Boston, before becoming a full-time examiner, he worked for six years on an anti-narcotics squad.

He has over 20 years of polygraph service, conducting approximately 2,500 exams across the United States, Central and South America, and Iraq.

As the son of Cuban refugees, he is a fluent Spanish speaker and can conduct polygraph examinations in Spanish.

Michael De La Pena is the author of the Coyote Wars Trilogy, an FBI suspense series featuring a family of domestic terrorists and the polygraph examiner who discovers their plot to bring the country to its knees. His series includes The Coyote Wars, The Last Coyote, and Coyote Rising in addition to a prequel, The Devil’s Henchmen.

Mike has been a featured speaker on polygraph cases and concepts at the American Polygraph Association and other polygraph groups in Singapore and Ukraine at the invitation of those governments. He currently works as a private international polygraph examiner and consultant, working with the Albanian government to train and monitor their program.