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The bandits intended to rob a credit union at gunpoint, then make their escape in inner tubes waiting nearby.
But an informant sold them down the river, and police torpedoed the bizarre robbery/getaway plot.
Federal court documents allege that Patrick Jay Burr, 46, and Heather Giles Burr, 33, were planning to pull a heist at the Utah Community Credit Union in Provo last Friday.
They were arrested Thursday after their purported partner in crime - who actually was a confidential informant - alerted authorities of the alleged plot, in which the would-be bandits would rob the bank then float away down the nearby Provo River in inner tubes.
"I guess they thought no one would have been looking in the river," said Assistant U.S. Attorney John Huber.
Besides, the river was flowing at only 4 mph, said Brian McInerney, a hydrologist for the National Weather Service in Salt Lake City.
"It's not the quickest way to get away," McInerney said. "A fast car could go 70."
The Burrs have been charged with conspiracy to commit bank robbery. At a hearing Tuesday, U.S. District Magistrate Brooke Wells ordered Patrick Burr held in jail and Heather Burr in a federal halfway house until their case is resolved.
Robert Almgren, a Layton police detective and a member of the Project Safe Neighborhoods/ATF Task Force, said in an affidavit that the confidential informant was wired to secretly record conversations with the Burrs. The two, who live in a Provo mobile home park, had met the informant through a man being investigated for illegal firearms trafficking, Almgren wrote.
The Burrs allegedly told the informant that they had been involved in previous bank robberies in Utah. Patrick Burr also said he currently was committing residential and construction site burglaries throughout Utah County, according to the informant.
In addition, the Burrs allegedly said they had acquired masks, gloves and inner tubes to use in the robbery and getaway.
The two also were set to buy a gun from the man under investigation for firearms trafficking, the informant said.
The getaway part of the plan later allegedly changed to escaping in a stolen car after Heather Burr's vehicle, which had the inner tubes inside, was impounded Nov. 24 on an insurance violation. The Burrs planned to steal a car from a sales lot by using copied keys on Thursday, the day before robbing the credit union, according to Almgren.
He said the informant and Patrick Burr looked into the lobby of the credit union, at 1900 N. Canyon Road, through its front windows on Nov. 28 in preparation for the robbery. Their conversation was monitored through a body wire on the informant, Almgren said.
The lawman said the plan was for Patrick Burr and the informant to go inside while Heather Burr remained outside. The husband allegedly planned to pack heat.
"Patrick Burr told [the informant] that he did not want to 'do a note job' in reference to committing the robbery and said that he needed to get a firearm for the robbery," Almgren wrote.
Huber said authorities then arrested the Burrs before they endangered anyone.