[naviga:img class="img-responsive" alt="Kevin A. Mason" src="/Assets/news2015/0816DayMason.JPG"/]

Kevin A. Mason

Norwich — Facebook has once again helped police solve a crime, this time a robbery in which a man with a large rock threatened a sales clerk and her 1-month-old baby.

According to police, the robbery took place just before 6 p.m. on Jan. 2 at the SAR Market, 219 Boswell Ave.

Through their investigation, officers learned a man wearing a hooded sweatshirt had entered the shop with a large rock and demanded money from the cash register. Police said the man told the female clerk he would take and hurt her baby, who was in a car seat behind the sales counter, if she didn’t cooperate.

As the man attempted to leave the store with the cash the woman gave him, a customer entered and tried unsuccessfully to stop the suspect.

Neither the clerk nor the baby was injured.

Police on scene used a K-9 to try to track the suspect, but couldn’t locate him. Eventually, officers posted photos captured by surveillance cameras to Facebook in the hopes someone could help them identify the suspect.

A combination of the tips they received and other investigative efforts led them to 29-year-old Kevin A. Mason, whose last known address was 9 Pequot Road, Apt. 1, Uncasville.

Police, who obtained a warrant for Mason’s arrest, said the convicted felon was arrested and held in Wisconsin earlier this year. The state recently granted Norwich police authority to extradite Mason, so officers traveled there to take him into custody and arrived back in Norwich with him Tuesday.

Mason is facing charges of second-degree robbery, risk of injury to a minor, first-degree reckless endangerment and sixth-degree larceny.

Held on a $35,000 bond, he was due Wednesday in Norwich Superior Court.