Kmart bandit caught with 1,340 oxycodone pills — now his plea deal could send ex to jail

Three strikes, and Joshua Hanks was out.

After robbing his third Columbus Kmart pharmacy of oxycodone, Hanks found police had tracked him to his room at the Extended Stay motel on Armour Avenue, so he got out:

He crawled out through a hole he’d made in the wall under the sink, to get to a room rented by another guest, and ran out that room’s door.

Soon he was running out the front door of the motel, out into the parking lot, where police chased him down.

Though Hanks had planned an imaginative escape, he did not immediately bolt, when the heat was on. He first tried to draw police away, calling 911 to report an accident on the Interstate 185 entrance ramp to Macon Road, and an armed robbery at Uncle Bob’s Self Storage.

The police didn’t bite at the diversions he dangled, so Hanks had to go through the wall.

It was April 6, 2015. Around noon that day, Hanks had walked into what was then a Kmart at 2500 Airport Thruway, threatened three workers with a replica handgun, and demanded oxycodone. He got his pills and headed for the parking lot, where a witness saw him get into a car and followed him.

Hanks ditched the car and ran to his hotel, but police were on his trail, and the room was in his name. So, he soon was surrounded, except for his hole in the wall.

“There was a temporary patch on the wall where plumbing work had been done,” police reported. “He entered that room which had been rented by another individual and exited the door of that room in an effort to evade capture.”

Seizing Hanks’ loot, police counted 1,340 oxycodone pills, worth around $36,465.

They discovered Hanks’ girlfriend Leslie Bottoms, then-38, had shared the room. They charged her with the April 6 Kmart robbery, but not Hanks’ earlier ones, on March 8 and March 17, 2015.

A grand jury indicted Hanks on four counts of armed robbery, possessing a controlled substance with the intent to distribute it, criminal trespass, making a false report of a crime and obstructing police.

On Friday, after Hanks pleaded guilty to the robbery, drug and trespass charges, Superior Court Judge Bobby Peters sentenced him to 20 years in prison with 12 to serve and the rest on probation.

Hanks’ charges of falsely reporting a crime and obstructing police were dropped.

As part of his plea deal, he agreed to testify against his former girlfriend, whose armed robbery charge is based on allegations she not only shared the motel room, but also knew about the robbery and got some of the loot.

A hearing on the status of her case is set for May 8.

This story was originally published April 19, 2018 at 2:21 PM with the headline "Kmart bandit caught with 1,340 oxycodone pills — now his plea deal could send ex to jail."