Bethany Beach Man Charged in Robbery of Ocean View Store

Ocean View, DE – Troopers have arrested a 24 year old Bethany Beach man after he committed a robbery at an Ocean View grocery store.

The incident occurred at approximately 8:00 p.m. Wednesday October 1, 2014 when a man entered Hocker's Deli located at 34960 East Atlantic Avenue and approached the register to pay for a .30 cent piece of candy. When the 16 year old female employee opened the drawer to make change, the male lunged across the counter and began grabbing money out of the till. The employee attempted to prevent the man from committing the theft by grabbing ahold of some of the money, but he forcibly removed the cash by pulling it out of her hand. The suspect then fled the store in an unknown direction with an undisclosed amount of currency.

Within 15 minutes of the robbery being reported to the Sussex County Emergency Operations Center (9-1-1), a separate call from a concerned citizen was received reporting that a suspicious subject had just run through their yard located in the 32000 block of Roxana Road. Troopers converged on the area and located an abandoned Ford Escort parked on Roxana Road near the residence but were unable to locate anyone matching the description of the suspect.

A computer inquiry on the Ford Escort revealed it was registered to Benjamin R. Marx, 24 of Bethany Beach. After numerous attempts to locate Marx at various addresses in the surrounding towns, he was finally located hiding in a bathroom closet of his mother's home located in Ocean View around 12:15 a.m. this morning. While conducting a pat-down search of Marx, he was found to be in possession of one bag of heroin (.015 grams) and a hypodermic needle as well as some of the cash stolen during the robbery.

Benjamin Marx was taken into custody without further incident and transported back to Troop 4 in Georgetown where he was charged with Robbery 2nd, Possession of Heroin, and Possession of Drug Paraphernalia. He was arraigned at JP3 and committed to Sussex Correctional Institution on $4,000.00 secured bond.