A 35-year-old Ocala man will spend the next three decades behind bars after a federal jury found him guilty of armed robbery at a bar in Pensacola and possessing a firearm as a convicted felon.
On Thursday, Jason R. Coody, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Florida, announced that Quinton L. Pete has been sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for attempted Hobbs Act robbery and possession of a firearm as a convicted felon. His imprisonment will be followed by three years of supervised release.
After a three-day trial held in August, the federal jury found Pete guilty of all charges related to the incident that occurred at Coyote’s Sports Bar on Bayou Boulevard in Pensacola on March 9, 2022.
According to court records, a few minutes before 4 a.m. on the day of the incident, two employees at Coyote’s Sports Bar were shot at point blank range by Pete during an attempted robbery of the business.
The victims were initially unable to identify the shooter due to the wounds they sustained during the attempted robbery, though they did provide a general description of the suspect to law enforcement.
Investigators obtained surveillance video footage from surrounding businesses and observed a white Jeep Grand Cherokee near the bar at the time of the crime.
The Pensacola Police Department put out a BOLO (be on the lookout) on the Jeep Grand Cherokee. The following day, Pete was apprehended by law enforcement in Dallas, Texas while driving a matching vehicle that was registered to him.
Pete was in possession of a firearm, and a ballistics comparison revealed that it was the same firearm that was used in the commission of the robbery at Coyote’s Sports Bar. His phone location also placed him in the area of the bar at time the crime was committed.
Pete has prior felony convictions for burglary of a dwelling with a firearm; grand theft; and shooting at, within, or into a dwelling. He was released from prison just seven months prior to the incident at Coyote’s Sports Bar.
Additional firearm-related charges against Pete are also pending in central Florida.
The case was investigated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives with the assistance of multiple other law enforcement agencies including the Pensacola Police Department, Homeland Security Investigations, Grand Prairie Police Department in Dallas, the United States Marshals, and the Office of the State Attorney, First Judicial Circuit.
Assistant United States Attorneys David Goldberg and Jessica Etherton prosecuted the case.
This case is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods, a program that brings together all levels of law enforcement and the communities they serve in an effort to reduce violent crime and gun violence.