A boarding school-educated Briton has opened up about how he robbed banks in an effort to pay for IVF on a podcast.
Reed Domingo, 58, who now lives in Maidenhead, Berkshire, was living in San Diego when he stole over $64,000 (£50,000) in cash between June 2000 and July 2001 during numerous bank robberies.
He was arrested a year later, during a dawn raid by FBI agents on the home he shared with his wife Patrice, now 64, their daughter Angelique, now 24, and their stepson.
After standing trial, and pleading guilty to all the robbery charges, Reed was sentenced to nearly four years in prison and deported to the UK, where he had to remain because his criminal record means he cannot re-enter the US. .
Despite campaigning to re-enter the country for nearly two decades, he still hasn’t been able to return. His wife and his daughter still live in the United States, and the trio are reportedly eager to live together as a family.
The couple (pictured on their wedding day) spent thousands of dollars on IVF, before their daughter Angelique was born in 1998.
on his podcast Time with Mr. ReedReed, who was born and raised in Abergavenny, Wales to South African parents, talks about his idyllic family life and how it was shattered one morning when he was arrested.
Describing the early morning hours of that day during the first episode of Time with Mr Reed, Domingo says, “I really had a lot to be thankful for. Nestled next to me was the love of my life: my beautiful blonde Patrice from California.
‘We had met 15 years earlier and had been married for nine. I would honestly say that I was absolutely married to my soul mate.
The couple met after Reed (given Ridwaan) moved to San Diego while working for his father’s biotech company.
In the episode, he continues: “We had a beautiful Cape Cod-style house that was painted yellow and set on six and a half acres surrounded by 600 orange trees with 360-degree views of the ocean and mountains of Southern California.”
She went on to explain that it described her and Patrice’s “crowning achievement”: their daughter Angelique, who had been conceived after five years of nine grueling rounds of IVF.
According to Reed, the treatments cost more than $250,000, and after Angelique’s birth in 1998, the family’s debts skyrocketed.
Speaking on the podcast, she says: “The whole day I felt like everything was coming down on me… I couldn’t sleep… how can I get out of this?”
According to Reed Domingo, he knew that bank tellers were told to hand over cash without resistance during robberies.
Reed (pictured with his wife Patrice and daughter Angelique) has described his wife as the love of his life and his daughter as his greatest achievement.
Working as a programmer at a credit union at the time, he knew that bank tellers were told to hand over cash without resistance when robbed.
Then one day, when he found himself without almost $10,000 to pay the bills, he told himself that the next day he would commit a robbery.
And so the next day, during his lunch break, Reed grabbed a motorcycle helmet (a decoy, so the police were looking for a motorcyclist, not a driver) and drove to a highway bank branch, so he could easily merge into traffic when moving away from the scene.
In an attempt to hide his British accent, he printed a note to hand to the teller, demanding the cash.
The note read: ‘Keep calm. We are not kidding. Follow these instructions and all is well. Put $10K in the bag. Use 100, 50 and 20. No fake money, no dye packs.
Despite telling himself he wouldn’t do it again, Reed admits that he “felt wonderful” after the robbery and that he had bought himself time.
In the months that followed, he committed more robberies, once leaving Angelique sleeping in the car during the crime.
According to the podcast’s accompanying website: “Over the course of a year, from June 2000 to June 2001, Reed robbed eleven other banks, with mixed (and sometimes hilarious) results.
“From blowing up dye packets to forgetting his gun to giving a friendly cashier a $2,000 “tip,” Reed’s heists veer from slick to slapstick.
When the FBI raided Domingo and Patrice’s home in June 2002, they not only found the clothes he wore during the robberies, but were also able to identify him from photographs taken by Patrice during the robberies.
Reed (pictured) is currently trying to get back to the US, where the family reportedly wants to live together.
He pleaded guilty to all the robbery charges and was sentenced to 46 months.
The name of his podcast, Time with Mr Reed, refers to his time in the Terminal Island prison in Los Angeles, where he acted as a teacher to his fellow inmates, helping them earn their high school diplomas.
After serving his term, he was deported to the UK in 2005, where he worked as a personal trainer.
Despite moving to the UK in 2010, Patrice and Angelique did not settle in the area; his wife returned to the US in 2013 and her daughter followed after completing her GCSEs and A-levels.
Reed Domingo continues his attempts to return to the United States.