Man guilty on three robbery counts

PALMER -- A 20-year-old Big Lake man has been found guilty in Palmer Superior Court of three felony charges for his part in a 2001 armed robbery and car-jacking.

A jury last week found Jason A. Geisler guilty of three counts of first-degree robbery, a class A felony. Assistant District Attorney Rachel Gernat, who prosecuted the case, said the presumptive term is seven years in prison.

"It can be more than that if the court finds an aggravator," Gernat said.

The maximum penalty for first-degree robbery is 20 years in prison. Geisler is scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 6, 2004, by Judge Eric Smith.

The incident occurred Jan. 25, 2001. It began at 8:15 p.m. when a man wearing a white and blue bandana entered the Hatcher Pass Gateway Center store and pointed a gun at the clerk, according to Alaska State Troopers. The clerk lay down on the floor while the gunman took $178 in cash and fled, according to court documents.

Soon afterward, two men flagged down three teen-age boys who were driving near the intersection of Cottonwood Loop and Aspen Street in Wasilla, troopers said. When the teens stopped, one of the men ordered them out of the car at gunpoint and stole money from two of the boys, court documents said.

One man fired a shot from a .22-caliber handgun into the air, apparently to make the teens move faster, court documents said. Two of the robbers then drove away in the car.

Geisler was arrested the next day.

"They used force and had a weapon," Gernat said. "Jason used a gun. He was part of a spree that night."

Previously, Shannon Stenhoff was sentenced to three and a half years in prison for his part in the night's activities, and Geisler's half-brother James McAnulty was sentenced to 10 years in prison.