BANGOR – A 72-year-old Canaan man whose criminal record dates back to 1948 was sentenced Thursday to 171/2 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to robbing a Belgrade bank last February.

Robert Earl Quirion’s plea came as a bit of a surprise to U.S. District Court Judge John Woodcock and Assistant U.S. Attorney James McCarthy. Law enforcement officials, bank employees and witnesses who were in the courtroom Thursday had expected to testify at the accused bank robber’s trial rather than attend his sentencing.

Last month, Quirion withdrew his guilty plea during a hearing held before his scheduled sentencing. A jury-waived trial before Woodcock was scheduled for Thursday afternoon. Quirion apparently decided to plead guilty shortly before the trial was to get under way.

That decision, and the fact that he did not take responsibility for his actions, increased his sentence, Woodcock told the Canaan man Thursday. If he had gone forward with sentencing in December or had sought a continuance, he could have shaved as much as five years off his sentence.

Woodcock also admonished the elderly man, who has undergone two surgeries since his arrest, for not apologizing to bank employees for his actions when given the opportunity to address the court Thursday.

Quirion admitted that he robbed the Skowhegan Savings Bank in Belgrade on Feb. 18. According to news reports about his arrest, the man handed the teller a note, told her to put the money in an envelope and fled in his pickup truck. Quirion did not display a weapon during the robbery.

He was arrested about an hour after the robbery in Norridgewock. The $700 he took from the bank was recovered, according to McCarthy.

In addition to serving time in the state prison system, Quirion served six years in federal prison for the 1991 robberies of banks in Bingham and New Jersey. He successfully completed four years of supervised release in September 2002, but robbed the Belgrade bank just five months later, according to court documents.

McCarthy told the judge that in Quirion’s taped confession, he told law enforcement officials that he robbed the bank so he would be sent back to prison.

“This crime has earmarks of ‘The Shawshank Redemption,'” Woodcock said Thursday, referring to the film based on a Stephen King story. “If Mr. Quirion wanted to return to prison, then he knew what he was doing and the law imposes serious consequences for his conduct.”

McCarthy, who also prosecuted Quirion for the 1991 bank robberies, said Thursday that he would have been happier if Quirion had not returned to federal court.