ATM Theft Cases End in Prison

Sentencing Result in Case Involving Numerous ATM and Construction Equipment Thefts

The Washoe County District Attorney’s Office has announced that a defendant previously convicted on multiple theft charges has been sentencing to over 32 years in prison. Shane Patrick Ryan, age 45 from Washoe County pled guilty in January to 4 counts of Theft and 1 count of attempted theft in District Court. He was sentenced last Tuesday to 32 years, 6 months in prison with parole eligibility set to begin after a minimum of 13 years has been served. In addition to the prison sentence, Ryan was ordered to pay restitution of over $600,000 dollars to the victim businesses in the case.

The case against Ryan began in February 2020 when detectives with the Regional Repeat Offender Program (ROP) began an investigation into the attempted theft of an ATM machine from a Spark credit union. During the investigation ROP detectives identified Ryan as the suspect who had committed numerous thefts of construction equipment such as vehicles, tractors and trailers, which he then used to steal or attempt to steal several ATM machines. Theses thefts were committed over the course of three months and resulted in financial loss for the involved banks and companies of over $617,000 dollars. Following their investigation, ROP detectives arrested Ryan and the case was referred to this office and prosecuted by Chief Deputy District Luke Prengaman. At sentencing, Prengaman praised the long-term surveillance and investigation conducted by the ROP detectives, explaining that Ryan’s sophisticated M.O. would likely have allowed him to get away with his crimes were it not for ROP.

In addition, the above sentence was ordered to run consecutive to a conviction in a 2021 Burglary case where Ryan was convicted of having burglarized a former employer’s business. Ryan was sentenced to a term of 90 months, with parole eligibility after 36 months has been served. Restitution was ordered in the amount of $63,000 dollars.    

The Washoe County District Attorney’s Office continues to work closely with the Northern Nevada Repeat Offender Program on cases involving the prosecution of habitual criminals. The goal of this partnership is to prevent new victims from falling prey to these career criminals by securing lengthy prison sentences against them.