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银行抢劫犯来了

级别: 管理员
'Please Select YES to Rob Us'

Faced with a plague of bank robberies in New York City by unarmed and often unsophisticated criminals, frustrated officials are ready to turn up the heat -- on the banks.

The banks, in jumping on a national trend to be "customer friendly," have gone overboard, the officials say. And the crooks are taking advantage.

The city's police commissioner, Raymond W. Kelly , and New York State Banking Department Superintendent Diana Taylor said last week that if some banks continue to shrug off calls to beef up security, industrywide legislation may result.

In their effort to force banks to take a more active role in thwarting robberies, Mr. Kelly and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg have been trying for months to shame them into setting aside some of the policies -- such as wide-open teller counters -- that officials say have made them soft targets.

Despite New York City's much-lauded decline in crime, bank robberies are going the opposite direction, nearly tripling this year through Sept. 2 compared with the same period a year ago. "This is seen as easy money," Mr. Kelly says. "That's the word on Rikers Island," he added, referring to New York City's huge island jail complex.

The way the law-enforcement officials see it, the bankers themselves must share blame. Over the past decade, teller windows with metal bars, armed guards, and short hours have gone the way of the manual typewriter. In April, Messrs. Kelly and Bloomberg called on New York banks to swing the pendulum the other direction by adopting a package of "best practices" meant to deter robbery. The goal is to make some banks look less like a Starbucks and more like a secure facility.

As a result, Ms. Taylor, whose department traditionally has treated robberies as a local police matter, said she will send a sharply worded letter to top bank executives this week criticizing the industry's response to the problem, and pressing them to comply with the police recommendations. While state banking authorities can't mandate changes, she said bank examiners will begin weighing security when assessing the "safety and soundness" of institutions.

"Hopefully, banks will realize that we're very, very serious about this," says Ms. Taylor. "Our leverage is, if you don't follow these suggestions, and something bad happens during a robbery, the legislature is going to promulgate legislation. And it's going to be one size fits all. I don't think banks are going to like that."

While banks such as the Banco Popular North America unit of Popular Inc. have embraced the police recommendations, Mr. Kelly said, others like Commerce Bancorp Inc. have balked at some of them, questioning their effectiveness.
"It's embarrassing for everyone," said John Kanas, chairman and chief executive of North Fork Bancorp., who says he has beefed up security at its 78 branches in the city. "But I don't know what else to do, other than lock up the doors of the branches. It's costing us a fortune."

As crime dropped in New York City in the late 1990s, bank robberies fell to 136 in 2000 from 235 in 1997. Last year, however, bank robberies shot up to 250. Through Sept. 2 of this year, while the overall crime rate has dropped by 6.1%, there have been 312 bank robberies, 56 involving weapons.

The police want banks to install bandit barriers, bullet-resistant windows intended to keep would-be robbers from the tellers and the money, and to hire "greeters" for the lobbies, where they would approach customers with offers of assistance. Police say some bank robbers they have arrested have told them they steer clear of such branches. Police also want banks to install digital surveillance cameras that are clearly visible to customers, and to keep them in working order.

They also want banks to hand robbers packs of currency rigged with exploding dye packs, and decoy currency packages that contain less money than they appear to.

In an effort to embarrass the banks into action, Mr. Kelly has begun ranking banks according to the number of robberies per branch. The most robbery-prone banks this year in New York, according to the police, as of Sept. 2: Commerce Bancorp (16 robberies/17 branches); North Fork (30/78); Banco Popular (10/32); J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (51/192); and FleetBoston Financial Corp. (13/56). Other large banks on the list include HSBC Bank USA, a unit of HSBC Holdings PLC, (16/102), and Citigroup Inc., (15/129).

Mr. Kelly has been especially critical of Commerce. While the Cherry Hill, N.J., bank uses greeters and dye-packs in its 17 New York branches, it has been unwilling to install bandit-barriers or make its security cameras visible.

A criminologist who is a consultant to Commerce, speaking on the bank's behalf on the robbery issue, said such changes would interfere with the company's business model.

The consultant, Lawrence Sherman of the University of Pennsylvania, contends that Commerce's high robbery rate is more a function of its long hours than its security practices. He argues that there is no solid evidence that the police recommendations, which he refers to as "off-the-cuff ideas," are effective. "Until there is such evidence, it would be bad public policy to impose them," he argues.

Even some bankers who have made the changes are unsure of their effectiveness.

"It's interesting that the police commissioner is blaming it on the banks," says Mr. Kanas of North Fork. The Melville, N.Y., banking company has added bandit barriers and greeters at its New York branches, he said. Nevertheless, one branch in Long Island with upgraded security and an unarmed guard was recently robbed, he said.

Banco Popular, on the other hand, contends that implementing the recommendations at its 32 New York branches has made a marked difference.

"We had a day in May when we were hit three times," recalls Michele Imbasciani, who runs the Puerto Rican bank's New York branches. The bank moved rapidly to implement the recommendations. "Since then, we have not had a robbery."

Clearly, the robbers are getting more brazen. On July 11, for example, a 46-year-old paroled bank robber named Curtis Barthrop walked into a midtown Manhattan branch of Citigroup's Citibank, according to the police, and handed the teller a note that read: "This is a robbery. I need all one hundred bills or I'll blow this m---- up." The teller closed the cash drawer and walked away. Mr. Barthrop, the police say, walked out.

Forty-seven minutes later he showed up at another Citibank and handed the teller a similar note, the police say. The teller pressed a holdup alarm and walked away. Once again, Mr. Barthrop just walked out, police say.

Thirteen minutes later, he arrived at a branch of J.P. Morgan Chase, and produced yet another note. The teller pressed an alarm and handed Mr. Barthrop $300 in a pack of bills made to look like more, the police allege.

Eleven days later, two detectives arrested Mr. Barthrop, charging him with the robbery and attempted robbery of 11 different banks between July 9 and 19.

The police commissioner credits Citigroup for training its tellers to walk away from an attempted robbery, if they feel comfortable doing so. Mr. Kelly said he thinks J.P. Morgan Chase "needs to do more."

"Our robbery prevention program incorporates most of the NYPD's suggested tactics," responded Ed Ludemann, director of security at J.P. Morgan and formerly a Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent in charge of its New York office. The bank uses bandit barriers at 95% of its New York City branches, he said, and in 24% of incidents, tellers have walked away.

Spokesmen for Citigroup and Fleet declined to comment on security procedures.

Mr. Kelly said he is considering recommending the walk-away tactic to all banks, provided they have bandit barriers.

Mr. Kanas of North Fork, for one, is leery of such an approach. "The police have suggested that the bank employees be a little more aggressive," he said. "That's easy to say. But who could sleep at night if over a couple of thousand dollars some young woman [teller] gets killed."
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