Reducing Violent Bank Robberies in Los Angeles.

During the 1960s, an average of 400 bank robberies occurred each year in the FBI's Los Angeles Field Office (FBILA) jurisdiction, which exceeds 40,000 square miles and consists of seven counties. In the 1970s, the number of bank robberies doubled to almost 800 each year. In 1978, the number of robberies exceeded 1,000, placing the Los Angeles area ahead of the rest of the nation in total bank robberies per year and earning it the title "Bank Robbery Capital of the World." The area retained this title with an average of 1,400 bank robberies per year in the 1980s, which accounted for 20 to 30 percent of all bank robberies in the United States. After peaking at 2,641 in 1992, by 1998, the number of robberies had plummeted to 656, the lowest in 30 years. A number of factors contributed to both the meteoric rise and precipitous fall of these violent crimes.

CONTRIBUTING FACTORS

In general, two factors caused the extensive number of bank robberies in the FBJLA territory. First, the area of Southern California surrounding Los Angeles has experienced unprecedented population growth since the 1960s. Approximately 17 million people now reside there. Second, California law historically has permitted unlimited branch banking. Today, more than 3,500 federally insured commercial banks, savings banks, and credit unions conduct operations in seven counties. This vast number of robbery targets, coupled with the population growth, and attendant social and criminal problems, particularly increased narcotics addictions and the invasion of youthful street gangsters onto the bank robbery scene, produced an increase in bank robberies.

Nothing, however, prepared the region for the explosion of bank robberies in the early 1990s. In 1992, the 2,641 robberies that occurred in the FBILA area compelled FBI agents to investigate approximately 1 bank robbery every 42 minutes of each business day. This dramatic increase in the number of robberies occurred as California banking, always a fiercely competitive industry, faced the dual challenges of an influx of new branches of out-of-state banking corporations and a renewed incidence of bank mergers. To address these competitive challenges, the executives of various banks decided to solidify their customer base by expanding daily business hours. Banks opened earlier, closed later, and expanded their business hours to Saturdays, and, in some instances, Sundays. In order to keep pace, other bankers throughout the state quickly followed suit. These additional hours of operation dramatically increased the exposure to robbery of California bank branches by approximately 40 percent. Using various methods, bandits took full advantage of this newly widened opportunity.

Bank Robbery Methods

Even more alarming than the increasing number of bank robberies was the type of robbery expanding fastest. Generally, criminals use two basic methods to rob banks -- the "one-on-one" robbery, frequently featuring a demand note, and the "takeover," a rapidly growing violent tactic.

In one-on-one situations, robbers deliver a spoken or written robbery message to a single victim teller. Robbers avoid attention by speaking softly to one victim, if they speak at all, and by keeping commotion to a minimum. Other individuals in the bank may remain completely unaware of the robbery.

In contrast, criminals who use the takeover robbery method usually demand attention and involve multiple subjects. They intimidate victims with various combinations of aggressive action, including storming into the bank, shouting obscenities, jumping on or over counters, physically attacking employees or customers, and waving or firing guns. These forms of aggression help give the bandits complete control of the premises. Control is central to takeover robberies, which sharply escalate the level of threats and violence. More traumatic and potentially explosive than one-on-one robberies, takeovers accounted for just 3 to 5 percent of all bank robberies in the Los Angeles area until late 1991. Between 1992 and 1996, this percentage increased dramatically to approximately 20 percent. The takeover percentage of total robberies in Los Angeles from 1997 to 1998 rose to 28 percent--a historical high.

Gang Activity

The increase in the percentage of takeover robberies in relation to total bank robberies during this decade resulted directly from street-gang activity. In late 1988 and early 1989, a small group of young South Central Los Angeles gang members affiliated with the Rollin 60s Grips gang began to frequent crack cocaine houses operated by other Rollin 60s members. These gangsters initially recruited or strong-armed crack cocaine addicts, who patronized these houses, to function as bandits at a preselected bank.

The gangsters prepared a demand note for the addicts, drove them to the bank, and told them how to present the note to an individual teller. After obtaining the money, the addicts returned to the car and gave it to their "sponsors," who in turn gave the addicts $50-$100 or crack cocaine. The sponsors kept the remainder of the stolen money. If police arrested the addicts during the robbery, the sponsors merely left the scene to recruit another addict. These robberies flourished from 1989 to 1991, accounting for almost 250 bank heists as other street gangsters replaced addicts as recruited bandits.

Then, things changed in September 1991, when a small group of takeover robbers known as the West Hills Bandits, stole $436,000, making it the largest single takeover robbery in the FBILA region's history at that time. When the amount of the robbers' loot leaked to the press and was published, the Rollin 60s, who already sponsored multiple note jobs, promptly changed direction and went full time into the takeover robbery business.

The fourth quarter of 1991 exploded with takeover robberies as other South Central gangs sought to emulate the success of the Rollin 60s' organized robberies. From late 1991 to 1993, several individuals and groups who at one time had belonged to or associated with street gangs usually affiliated with the Grips became takeover robbery "organizer-sponsors." They never entered the bank where they might leave fingerprints, witnesses might identify them, or surveillance cameras might photograph them. These original gangsters (OGs), who were in their mid- to late-20s, recruited much younger neighborhood street youths, some as young as 15 or 16 years old, to act as the actual bandits inside the bank. OGs easily recruited these youngsters, enticing them with "easy money," increased notoriety among their peers, or the prospect of living out an action fantasy.

On several occasions, FBILA investigators determined that "talent scouts" sent by these organizers actually went to several South Central Los Angeles area high schools and forced students out of the cafeteria line to participate in bank robberies. Once recruited, organizers provided them weapons if they did not have their own, transportation in a stolen car to a preselected bank, and hasty instructions for the roles they would play once inside. Frequently, organizers told these youths to fire shots and act aggressively to intimidate as many people as much as possible. Thus, once the realm of only the most experienced bandits who were more interested in maximizing profits than terrorizing victims, takeover robberies became the province of "amateurs," who knew only the fundamentals of street crime. Takeover robberies became, in essence, indoor muggings.

Despite the unique attributes of the Los Angeles area, many corruptive social and criminal trends originate there and spread rapidly to the rest of the nation. By mid-1998, FBILA already had received numerous communications from various jurisdictions throughout the United States, as well as the remainder of California, indicating that organized bank robbery crews of street gangsters had traveled far from their home base in Los Angeles. They had spread the contagion of the L.A.-style takeover.

LAW ENFORCEMENT RESPONSE

After painstaking work by more than 50 FBILA special agents, two assistant U.S. attorneys, and local law enforcement agencies, FBILA built a strong criminal enterprise case against several of the most prolific bank robbers in history. In May 1993, FBILA and local police arrested the two originators of these innovative takeover robberies, and in November 1993, after pleading guilty to bank robbery charges, the subjects received prison sentences of 25 and 30 years, respectively. FBILA believes these subjects planned, organized, and promoted more than 175 bank robberies, including 85 demand note jobs and 90 takeovers. Additionally, FBILA and local law enforcement agencies believe that several street gangsters directly imitated their role as organizers and caused the continuation of takeover-bank robberies in the Los Angeles area during the past 5 years. This theory concerning criminal enterprise bank robberies is supported by interviews of recently arrested takeover-robbery bandits and the known lack of groups of bandits who rob together as cohesive units.

Cooperating with Financial Institutions

Fortunately, the dire statistics regarding total bank robberies and takeovers have reduced dramatically since 1992. By the end of 1998, the number of robberies had fallen to 656--a 75 percent reduction and the lowest number in 30 years--with violent takeovers reduced by two-thirds.

The most important factor in reducing bank robberies involved establishing an effective working relationship between law enforcement agencies and financial institutions. The evolution of this relationship dates back to the early 199 Os. As the number of bank robberies, particularly violent takeovers, skyrocketed, the FBILA initiated a series of regularly scheduled conferences with bank security directors and local law enforcement administrators. At these conferences and at formal meetings of various bank security associations, both FBI special agents and local law enforcement officers with bank robbery expertise served as speakers and advisors. As a result, members of the banking community and law enforcement agencies forged a new, close-knit working relationship. Subsequently, the banking community implemented one of the first and most positive effects of this new working relationship--its law enforcement-endorsed plan to construct bullet-resistant "bandit barriers" or access control units (ACUs) at numerou s local branch offices deemed "robbery prone." Although expensive, these devices proved cost-effective by dramatically reducing overall bank robberies while virtually eliminating violent takeovers.

Bandit barriers--clear, bullet-resistant, Plexiglas partitions-- completely enclose the teller and adjacent cash storage areas, extending from the top of the counter to the ceiling or from the floor to the ceiling at the entryway. ACUs consist of an electronically controlled, double-door entry portal and adjacent exit portal. Customers access the inside of the bank, one at a time, by entering through the outer door of the entry portal. When the outer door closes, a device conducts an automatic magnetometer-type search for weapons. If the search proves negative, the inner door automatically unlocks, allowing entry into the facility. If the search is positive, indicating a possible weapon, the bullet-resistant second door remains locked, and the person must retreat from the portal. These units originally featured a "capture" option that locked a person with a weapon inside either portal. Administrators strongly recommend excluding this feature for customer/ employee safety reasons.

Smaller facilities with limited walk-in traffic use a more limited and less costly model of the ACU. This version consists of a single, reinforced, electronically locked entry door that customers open by inserting an encoded plastic card into a slot and then entering a personal identification number on an attached keypad. Bank employees can override both versions of the ACU by activating an electronic switch inside the bank when they recognize a customer denied access by the system.

Imposing Strict Sentences

Another contributor to this positive turnaround evolved from the Federal Uniform Sentencing Guidelines of 1987, which abolished the preexisting federal parole system. An inmate now must serve at least 85 percent of a federal sentence, with just 15 percent reduction for good behavior. Therefore, bank robbers sentenced in the Los Angeles area since 1987 do not return as quickly to the street to possibly repeat their offenses. This change, in combination with the increased use of Title 18, U.S. Code, Section 924(c), which mandates minimum, mandatory, and consecutive prison time for use of a firearm during the commission of a violent felony, including any federal bank robbery, has gained the attention of the Los Angeles area's career bank robbers.

Focusing on Follow-up

Law enforcement agencies have taken advantage of the steady reduction in bank robberies and used more of their resources in aggressive follow-up investigations. The ability to refocus bank robbery investigations beyond the day of occurrence has enabled FBILA and local law enforcement agencies to more quickly and effectively identify and apprehend serial bandits before they rob additional banks.

The close working relationship between law enforcement agencies and the banking community also has aided in this follow-up phase of bank robbery investigations. Specifically, as selected bank surveillance photographs in violent robberies become available, FBILA quickly requests and receives reward commitments from individual banks and banking associations. Local print and television media provide wide circulation to both surveillance photographs and reward offers. As a result, FBILA can solve cases and arrest subjects more quickly and did so in over 95 highprofile bank robbery cases from 1997 to 1998.

CONCLUSION

As FBILA looks to the future, a return to the early 1990s Wild West robbery days seems unlikely considering the now-highly coordinated efforts of FBILA, local law enforcement, and the Southern California banking community. Aided by security devices, which have made banks a more difficult target, and enhanced federal sentences of convicted bank robbers, Los Angeles area bank robberies have declined steadily.

The Los Angeles area's continued population growth and social and criminal problems may cause the region to remain the Bank Robbery Capital of the World. However, by employing FBILA's solulions to curb bank robberies, perhaps other law enforcement agencies can avoid challenging that dubious distinction.