Here you have a supposed smart kid who did something that will forever change his life because of a gang. Is the pull that strong to do something so stupid and reckless? The thug culture has been so glamorized by media that they’ve made it cool to commit a crime like this. This kid’s life is toast…

He’ll have plenty of time to study in prison.

A dapper teenage bandit accused of smashing a display case and swiping pricey watches in a daring Midtown heist is also the valedictorian of his Brooklyn high school, sources said Wednesday.

Omar Rawlins, 19 — part of a three-man crew that allegedly snatched $700,000 worth of pricey timepieces from Tourneau Tuesday — is an “academic leader” at Roads Charter School in Bedford-Stuyvesant, his lawyer Jennifer Brown said at his Manhattan Federal Court arraignment.
But despite his excellent grades, Rawlins is also an “extremely dangerous” member of the Crips street gang, Assistant US Attorney Jessica Lonergan fired back.

roberrymadisonPHOTOS ABOVE OF THE TWO OTHER SUSPECTS IN THE ROBBERY

He didn’t use his brain when he stuffed five gold Rolex watches in a duffel bag and bolted from the luxury watch shop, she said.
Manhattan Federal Court Judge Andrew Peck was baffled by the whiz-kid gangster — calling him a walking contradiction.
“I’m a little curious … how somebody goes from being a valedictorian [who is] about to graduate from high school to armed robbery,” Peck mused to the courtroom.
“He can study while in jail for a day or two. There won’t be any distractions,” Peck quipped.
The judge added,“ I’m being facetious but this is a serious crime.”
Wearing a black T-shirt and sagging shorts that exposed his red boxers, Rawlins sat quietly as Peck set his bond at $100,000 or $5,000 cash.
“You’re much better going the valedictorian route than the Crips,” Peck advised the teenager, who is one month away from graduating high school.
Meanwhile, federal authorities stepped in to handle the case because foreign goods — Rolex watches from Switzerland — were stolen, police sources said.
Strategic Pattern Armed Robbery Technical Apprehension — a little-known agency made up of the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, NYPD and US Marshals — can lay down the law because Rolexes are made in Switzerland, police sources said.
Rawlins will do more time in prison under federal law, up to 30 years, police sources said.
The Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms is leading the investigation, sources said.
On Tuesday, Rawlins and two other men stormed the luxury watch shop on Madison Avenue near East 53rd Street, wearing dark suits and fedora hats, police sources said.
He and another man smashed open the watch case with hammers while the third crook fired two shots from a semi-automatic handgun into the floor and toward a worker, police sources said.
James Schollin — retired police officer who works at the store — heard the commotion and collared Rawlins before flagging down cops, police sources said.
The two other bandits got away, the sources said.

Investigators said one of the suspects is dark-skinned and very heavy-set, and the other is also dark-skinned with a medium build.

Read more: NYP

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