1. Bank Robbers
1.1. Klaus Schmidt, 41, burst into a bank in Berlin, Germany, waved a pistol, and screamed, "Hand over the money!" The staff asked if he wanted a bag, to which he replied, "Damn right it's a
real gun!" Guessing Schmidt was deaf, the manager set off the alarm, saying later, "It was ridiculously loud, but he didn't seem to notice." After five minutes, punctuated by Schmidt's occasionally shouting, "I am a trained killer!" police arrived and arrested him. Schmidt then sued the bank, accusing them of exploiting his disability.
Five armed raiders burst into a bank in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. Their demands for money were foiled when the staff calmly opened up the safes to reveal rows of empty shelves. Unfortunately, robbers were let down by their ignorance of the republic's finances. No money had been delivered to any of the banks in Baku for the previous two months.
John Nashid from New York held up a bank in Bronx and got away with $17,000. He then led the police on a five-mile car chase through back streets, throwing fistfuls of dollars out of the window in an attempt to hold up pursuit. To a certain extent it may have worked, as $6,300 of his haul wasn't recovered; but it also left a trail for the 12 cop cars chasing him to follow. Eventually Nashid ran from his car, dived through the window of a nearby nursing home, and was finally captured near a garbage can at the rear of the building. He had entered the bank draped in a sheet with holes cut out for his eyes, and was immediately nicknamed 'Casper the Ghost' by police.
Scottish bank robber Derek Macfadden was caught because he was too law-abiding. Gun in hand, he held up a bank at Gif f nock, near Glasgow, and then raced off in his getaway car with £4,000. Despite being pursued by police, he halted at a red traffic light, where he was promptly arrested.
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Reader. Part V
1.5. A man arrived at a bank in East Hartford, Connecticut. He was wearing a blue bandanna across his face and brandishing a pistol as he yanked at the door, only to find it was locked. The bank had actually closed at 3:00! After staring at the door for a few seconds, the man ran off into a small black car. Staff still inside the bank called the police, but no arrest was made.
Perhaps even later in arriving was the gang who spent the night
cutting their way into a Lloyds bank in Hampshire, England. They
cut bars with a hydraulic saw, wrenched out a security grille, and
punched a hole through a wall The only problem was that the bank
' was closed down four years earlier, and the building was empty.
From Florence, Italy, is a tale in which the guards got it wrong: security men were all too eager to help a man with his foot in a cast as he hobbled into a bank on metal crutches. Ignoring the alarm from the metal detector at the bank's entrance, they guided the apparently disabled man to a cashier's register. There he dropped his crutches, pulled a gun, and grabbed $40,000 before sprinting away.
Michael Norton stole two security cameras from the lobby of a bank. The cops were sure it was Norton, one of the neigbourghood characters, because the last pictures the cameras took showed him unscrewing them from the wall mountings. Detective Thomas Hickey set off to cruise the streets and eventually found Norton. "Hey", called Hickey. "Could you explain to me how come the bank has your picture?" "I didn't rob the bank," Norton protested. "I just took the camera." Oops...