A Gaithersburg man walked into an M&T Bank on Darnestown Road on Thursday morning, slid a note across the counter demanding money and claiming he had a gun, and walked back out with nothing. The teller simply stalled long enough that the suspect gave up and fled, and by the end of the day, police had him in custody.
According to The MoCo Show, officers from the Montgomery County Police Department's 1st District responded to the bank in the 12100 block of Darnestown Road at approximately 9:57 a.m. Thursday after receiving reports of an attempted robbery. Police say the suspect, identified as 44-year-old Guarzmjon Aioubov of Gaithersburg, approached a teller and handed over a note demanding money while claiming he had a gun, according to DailyVoice.com.
The bank employee delayed handing over any cash, and Aioubov ultimately left the branch empty-handed. Montgomery County Police identified him as a suspect and secured an arrest warrant, and he was taken into custody before the day was out, per the same DailyVoice report. He was charged with attempted bank robbery and taken to the Montgomery County Central Processing Unit, where he remained in custody without bond as of Friday, police said.
How a Teller's Delay Derailed the Robbery
The tactic that worked in this case lines up with broader research on how bank robberies typically unfold. Bank personnel are trained to prioritize life safety during robbery attempts, and that training leads more than two-thirds of bank robberies to conclude in three minutes or less, according to the Arizona State University Center for Problem-Oriented Policing. A brief delay, rather than confrontation, can be enough to disrupt a robber who isn't prepared to wait around.
Demand notes like the one Aioubov allegedly used are also the norm rather than the exception. Industry research published by Pinkerton analyzing federal bank crime statistics found that roughly 58% of bank robberies involve a demand note, while only 14% involve a firearm actually being displayed. That gap between claimed and displayed weapons matters legally, since Maryland treats a written threat of a weapon as seriously as one that's shown.
What Aioubov Could Face in Court
Under Maryland Criminal Law Code Section 3-403, attempting to commit a robbery by displaying a written instrument claiming possession of a dangerous weapon is classified as armed robbery, a felony carrying a penalty of up to 20 years in prison, according to the Maryland General Assembly. Standard attempted robbery without any weapon claim, by contrast, is punishable by up to 15 years under Section 3-402 of the same code.
The Montgomery County Central Processing Unit, where Aioubov was booked, maintains automated jail booking records and daily arrest logs compiled through the county's corrections management software, according to Data Montgomery. The 1st District station that handled the response covers Gaithersburg, Rockville, North Bethesda and Potomac, and operates out of the county's Public Safety Headquarters at 100 Edison Park Drive in Gaithersburg.
A Declining but Still-Solvable Crime
Physical bank robberies have grown far rarer nationally than they once were. Federal bank robbery violations dropped to 1,362 nationwide in 2023, an 83% decline from the peak of 9,540 violations recorded in 1992, per FBI Bank Crime Statistics data. Despite that decline, the crimes that do happen remain among the more frequently solved violent offenses, with the FBI reporting a national clearance rate of approximately 60% for bank robberies — a statistic that tracks with how quickly Montgomery County detectives were able to identify and arrest Aioubov the same day the attempt occurred.
