Failure to plan cited as Konias' weakness

Kenneth Konias Jr. had millions on his mind and knew how to get it.

He researched armored truck robberies, but he probably didn't wake up the morning of Feb. 28 planning to kill his partner, security guard Michael Haines, 31, and flee with $2.3 million.

"We know he had talked about it to people, but I don't know how long he had seriously thought he could get away with it," Pittsburgh police Detective Peg Sherwood said. "I think it was all spur of the moment on that day."

Police and news reporters in Florida worked to retrace Konias' actions from the robbery until Tuesday, when authorities acting on a tip arrested the former Garda Cash Logistics guard in Pompano Beach. Details about his life on the run trickled out, showing he spent time holed up in a small, white house in a seedy part of the East Coast beach town, spending lavishly on prostitutes and strippers, drinking beer and snorting cocaine.

"I don't think he even stopped to think that 'somebody is going to get suspicious and Google me' and find out what he did," said Mary Ellen O'Toole, a retired FBI agent who specialized in behavior analysis. "That shows me this is someone whose critical thinking skills are just not working."

Characteristics investigators discovered about Konias appear to align with his brief time as a Floridian. Sherwood said he was obsessed with cleanliness, and his roommates in the boarding house said he always tried to wash dishes and tidy up.

Konias had long had an interest in law enforcement. A childhood friend remembered that while riding bikes, Konias would pull up behind them to try to write tickets. When he grew up, he failed the test to become an Allegheny County Police officer, Sherwood said.

Flashing cash and trying to earn a badge reveal his need to command attention, O'Toole said.

"This was his way to resolve his desire for fast money to impress people," she said.

Of course, demanding attention is not the best strategy for a fugitive.

"A lot of people probably got wind of him talking big talk," O'Toole said.

In a statement to the FBI, Konias said he shot Haines, of East McKeesport, when he tried to foil the robbery. Ann Haines told the Tribune-Review that her son took his job seriously and she wouldn't doubt he would try to intervene.

Haines was filled with dread when he learned Konias would be his partner, Haines' roommate Joe Krsul, 32, said. No one at Garda wanted to work with Konias after police once investigated him for stealing lottery tickets, and Konias seemed to know that, Krsul said.

"He probably got wind of the fact that maybe his job was in jeopardy," Sherwood said.

That day in February, Konias parked his 2006 tan Ford Explorer in Garda's employee lot off 32nd Street in the Strip District just before 8 a.m. He drove the armored truck and Haines rode in back as they made rounds, picking up cash at Rivers Casino, then heading north to Ross Park Mall. Their final stop was The Home Depot.

That's where investigators believe Konias shot Haines in the back of the head. Konias called a friend shortly after 1 p.m. and confessed to killing someone, saying, "My life is over."

Konias left the Garda truck idling on 31st Street with Haines' body in the back. Surveillance video shows him running to his Explorer and speeding away about 1:30 p.m.

Police believe he hid about $24,000 at his great-grandmother's grave in Munhall, then stashed about $250,000 under a car at his parents' Dravosburg home. The cash, which police recovered a week later, gave investigators insight into Konias' personality.

"It confirmed he was close to his family and he was not thinking and he would trip up," Sherwood said. "He wasn't doing things very smartly."

Konias left a blood-spattered Garda jacket on a hook in his parents' house, spent about three minutes upstairs and then left, his father told police. Konias ditched his cellphone on Route 51 near Century III Mall. A good Samaritan who found it later answered a detective's call.

Konias probably headed south within a day or so, Sherwood said, though he didn't appear to have an escape plan. She wouldn't say when or where police believe he last spent time in Pittsburgh.

"I think he was just running on adrenaline and fear," Sherwood said.

He had a two-hour jump on police, who, along with Garda workers, found Haines' body about 3:45 p.m. that day. Police alerted officers across Western Pennsylvania to watch for the vehicle, but the search didn't immediately go national.

Pittsburgh police filed robbery and homicide charges against Konias the next day, and the FBI charged him federally a few days later, sparking the nationwide manhunt.

Investigators used surveillance video, interviewed Konias' close friends and family and delved into his background.

"We were doing 18 hours straight, sometimes 23 hours straight," Sherwood said. "Go home, change, eat and come right back in. For the first three weeks, it was basically double shifts every day."

As leads in Allegheny County dried up, police tried to reach a national audience by offering the case - and a $100,000 reward Garda offered - to "America's Most Wanted" for a March 16 episode. The show generated tips, including three in Florida, but those proved fruitless, a producer with the show said.

As Konias' parents, Kenneth and Renee, made a televised plea for their son to surrender on March 22, Konias settled into a life of strip clubs and sex in South Florida.

He stayed in a motel before befriending a stripper named Summer, who took him to her home on SW Eighth Street about three weeks ago. Konias told his roommates that Summer stole about $30,000 from him after an argument a few weeks ago, and investigators are trying to determine whether others stole from him.

He mostly stayed in his room, but housemates said he often visited a storage unit. He paid for sex with prostitutes using cash and drugs, women said. A prostitute who learned about his background told a male friend, police said.

That man, whom police won't publicly identify, called Pittsburgh police on Monday night and said he knew the man they were looking for. Just after midnight, authorities arrested Konias at the home, recovering $1.1 million there and in the nearby storage facility.

Konias remains in a federal jail cell in Miami awaiting his return to Pittsburgh.

His plan, O'Toole said, "was so flawed and so poorly put together, there was no way he was really going to get away with it."