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Man gets nearly 13 years for Purple Parrot robbery Justin Jones Wednesday Mar 21, 2018 at 1:38 PM Mar 21, 2018 at 4:35 PM Nick Morgan Mail Tribune @mtcrimebeat A Central Point man will spend more than a dozen years in federal prison for robbing a Medford lottery deli of $500 at gunpoint. Justin Douglas Jones, 42, was sentenced Tuesday in U.S. District Court to 155 months in prison for the June 30, 2015, robbery of a Purple Parrot at 1913 Delta Waters Road. Jones pointed a silver Ruger .22-caliber handgun at a female employee and took $500 in cash from a back room. Jones told the employee, “Don’t move, do what I say or I will shoot,” according to a court document filed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the case. The employee was not hurt, nor were the three customers inside at the time. Jones was arrested within days of the robbery and pleaded guilty Nov. 6, 2017, to felony counts of felon in possession of a firearm, interference with commerce by robbery, and using, carrying and brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence. Jones’ arrest was among the earliest cases cracked with the aid of Medford police’s popular Facebook page, which garnered tips after police posted still photos of the robbery taken from surveillance video. The tips led to nationwide warrants in an investigation that involved the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Within two days of the robbery, police tracked Jones to a wooded area about six miles west of Selma, and spotted his vehicle at the Store Gulch Campground along the Illinois River. Josephine County sheriff’s deputies and Oregon State Police aided in his arrest, and police found a Ruger handgun in Jones’ backpack that matched witness descriptions, court documents say. Jones’ case was continued several times while he and his public defender waited on a ruling involving the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, court documents show. Jones pleaded guilty after the court ruled that third-degree robbery, Oregon’s least-severe robbery charge, did not count as a predicate for an Armed Career Criminal offense. Had Jones been sentenced as an armed career criminal, he would’ve faced a 15-year mandatory minimum sentence. Court records show Jones has been convicted of several felonies stretching back to the mid-1990s that include vehicle theft, second- and third-degree robbery, assaulting a police officer and first-degree burglary. Until Tuesday, Jones had a pending case in Jackson County Circuit Court charging him with two counts of supplying contraband, alleging he had a sharpened piece of metal and heroin at the jail. Senior Deputy District Attorney Allan Smith moved to dismiss the case Tuesday, after Jones was sentenced to federal prison. Reach Mail Tribune reporter Nick Morgan at 541-776-4471 or [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at @MTCrimeBeat.