Ranging as far as Carson City, Nevada , Jones and Sharp robbed six stages in less than four months as the tales of their hold-ups marched across the pages of San Francisco papers. Adding great interest to the stories were Sharp's appearance and mannerisms. Not the typical outlaw, Sharp was well dressed and extremely courteous when ordering Wells Fargo guards to throw down the strongbox. Jones, on the other hand, was a full-bearded, beastly looking man, with a deep-pitched voice that frightened both guards and passengers alike. While Jones held the driver and guard at bay, Sharp would line up the passengers and apologetically announce "A thousand pardons for the inconvenience I have caused you, but you see these are the hazards of my profession. We must relieve you of your valuables."  He was such a gentleman that he sometimes even returned valuables to weeping females. Afterwards, he would make a gracious bow, “thanking” them for their kindness, before the pair would make a clean getaway.

No one ever got hurt during these “polite” robberies, at least until the morning of September 5, 1880. Stopping the Wells Fargo Express traveling from Bodie, California to Carson City, Jones fired two shots, killing one of the stage horses. Mike Tovey, the stage guard, returned the fire, killing Dow, who was thought to have been drunk at the time. Sharp then continued with the robbery, leaving Dow’s lifeless body in the road and stage stranded by the dead horse still attached to the team.

Meanwhile, posters offering a $3,000 reward for Sharp began appearing all over California and Nevada which caused lawmen and bounty hunters alike, to aggressively trail the bandit.

Sharp was finally captured in San Francisco. Waiving extradition, the outlaw was taken back to Aurora, Nevada in chains. Charged with six robberies against Wells Fargo, a lynch mob gathered outside the jail night after night while Sharp awaited trial.  Sharp, who was known to bury his stolen hordes, was questioned intensely regarding their whereabouts, but Sharp refused to talk. In November, 1880 when a guard came to check on him, the man had vanished along with a 15 pound iron ball chained to his leg. Having worked a few bricks out of the jail wall, no one had seen him escape.

The award for his arrest was immediately increased to $5,000 and the posses were on him in full force. After being aggressively trailed for several weeks and tired, hungry, and cold, Sharp finally turned himself in to the Sheriff at Candelaria, Nevada. Sharp was then returned to Aurora, where he was convicted of five counts of robbery. When he refused to tell where the hidden loot was buried, an unsympathetic judge sentenced him to 20 years in the penitentiary.

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