THIS IS A BANK ROBBERY!

The victim, the detective, the psychologist

Bank robbery! Onscreen, criminal master-minds fleece the rich and escape with merited fortunes, but in fact bank robbers endanger the lives of clerks, who may never get over the shock.

At the nearing of Santa Claus, banks have more to do and robberies multiply, but a robbery is risky and worth on average only 22,600 DM.  Since this is no princely sum, most robbers must be feather-brained or broke. Indeed two thirds of them are jittery dilettantes, acting without forethought.

Clerks and bank-robbers are face to face for merely a few seconds, but on having seen their futures down the barrels of pistols, clerks have been known to complain. Only a trembling trigger-finger parts them from early graves. One robbery may pass without shots, but tombstones should be kept ready. Clerks often return to work as sitting targets the next day if still alive.

This reportage takes the glamour off robbery by showing it as a common threat to the lives of 765,000 bank employees in Germany alone.