From the way they are running, someone will have to proceed ahead of the other three, and open up the doors. Russell is under much pressure, and looks around to notice that he and Brian are the closest to the entrance door. One of them will have to open the door to the bank very shortly. As all the men creep closer and closer to the entrance of the bank, and are inches away from the door handle, Russell starts to panic. He quickly sees shocked expressions from the patrons inside of the bank, even before he opens the door.
During this moment, he is reminded of that evening Brian and his partner went to rob the bank he worked at, and how they all had the same reactions. The men haven’t even gone inside the bank yet, and Russell is already feeling guilty of his current actions. This was something that Russell beforehand, would tell himself that he wouldn’t let effect and bother him. It’s not until he’s put into that particular situation himself, that all of his previous rules and feelings change. The feeling of having someone afraid of you, makes Russell uncomfortable greatly. Brian as well begins to have a sudden wave of guilt. He witnesses all the expressions of fear on the patrons in the banks faces as well. The same faces he saw when he committed the heist against Russell’s bank. Brian doesn’t like to see people in pain, and this is the only part of robbing banks that he doesn’t like. Jesse who’s running behind Russell and Brian, then as well feels a great deal of guilt and pain from what they are about to do. He was a bank teller himself, at gunpoint being faced with fear. He’s now bringing that onto other people. It made him feel upset. Victor then develops the same feeling, which made him choke up, from robbing the “Sunset Credit Union.” He didn’t like to bring this type of energy or vibe towards others. It wasn’t a feeling that made him feel right at all.
The men continue onto the bank regardless. Brian opens the front door of the bank shouting.
“EVERYONE ON THE FUCKING FLOOR NOW. ON THE FLOOR NOW! I WANT EVERYONE TO HAVE THEIR FACES DOWN ON THE GROUND RIGHT NOW!”
Brian then waves his gun around to all the patrons in the bank. They begin to drop to the floor, with their hands behind their backs. Victor and Jesse stand in the lobby area, aiming their guns at all the patrons. Brian and Russell then walk straight towards the area of the bank tellers. There are three bank tellers present. One of them is a brunette female with curly hair. The other is an African-American woman with a bun hairstyle. The third bank teller is an older Caucasian woman with grey hair. Brian walks to the teller with brunette hair. Russell walks to the teller with her hair in bun. Victor and Jesse remain in the lobby, pointing their guns towards the patrons.
Brian starts to feel shocked at the current situation. As he was pointing the gun at the teller, he could see how scared she was of him. Brian started to feel bad for the woman for a short while, and it caused him to not be able to understand why he was there temporarily. He is now a part of a bank heist, and he doesn’t have time to reflect like that. The teller continues to stand still in shock, with Brian aiming his gun at her. He tries to push out the words to tell her to give him the money from the drawer.
Brian continues to stare at the woman for a few more seconds, and he quickly begins to remember that he is doing a robbery, and he doesn’t have time to choke up, like he’s doing now. The longer he waits being locked in his thoughts, the higher the chance it becomes of them not succeeding in this heist. Brian toughens himself up, and shouts at the woman to empty her cash drawer. She raises her hands in the air. While aiming his gun, he throws the big canvas bag at her. He then proceeds to shout at the bank teller.
“Give me all the money in the drawer, and throw it in the bag! Empty it all, and throw it in the bag. Do it now and do it fast! Empty everything out, I want it all! Hurry! Hurry!”
The teller then rapidly starts to put stacks of money inside Brian’s bag. Russell, remarkably is also choking up. He walks up to the bank teller and gives her eye contact. Russell starts to feel extreme empathy for the woman, that he’s causing this much stress and turmoil towards her. The teller looks at Russell in fear of her life, and puts her hands up to him as well. Russell manages to quickly shake it off, and throws his bag at the woman. Russell then shouts at the bank teller.
“Open the drawer, put the money in the bag! Empty everything out of the drawer and do it very fast! Empty all of it out, and do it fast! Empty it all out!”
The teller starts to quickly put money inside of Russell’s bag. At this time, Victor who’s standing with Jesse in the lobby area, notices there is a third teller. He decides to take charge, and pulls out a canvas bag from his pocket. Even though Victor and Jesse were both instructed to stay in the lobby area as lookouts, Victor still in the back of his mind, has a feeling this might be a chance for him to take action as well. Against Russell’s wishes and plans, Victor leaves Jesse alone in the lobby, and runs over to the third teller. At this same exact time, Brian unaware that Victor left the lobby, is now instructing the teller he was dealing with to empty her cash cart. While still aiming the gun towards her, he yells at the teller.
“Put all of that in the bag, give me all of it! I need you to put it all in their right now! Hurry! Put all of that in the bag now!”
The teller then starts to drop all the cash from her cash cart into Brian’s bag. Russell is also unaware Victor left his assigned spot. Russell congruently, while still pointing the gun at her, shouts at the teller to empty the contents of the cash cart.
“Drop everything in the bag! Drop everything! Very fast! Drop all of the money in there into the bag! Do it fast! Drop it all! Drop all the money!”
At this moment, Victor then points his gun at the third teller with the grey hair, and demands her to empty the money from her cash drawer.
“Open the drawer lady and give me all the money now! Do it now! I don’t have all fucking day sweetheart, give me all the fucking money lady! Do it now!”
The third teller begins to empty her cash drawer. Upon hearing this, Brian and Russell instinctively turn their heads towards Victor in absolute shock. They have no idea as to why he’s doing, what he’s currently doing. Brian’s teller has emptied her cash drawer and her cart. Brian then walks over to the lobby area where Jesse is with his money bag, and turns his head towards Victor enraged. He then begins to shout at him
“Man what the fuck are you doing?! You are a fucking dumbass man! What the hell do you think you’re doing?! Damn, you are such a dumbass!”
Victor ignores Brian, and the teller continues to drop money in Victor’s bag. Russell’s teller empties her cash cart. Russell begins to walk to the lobby area with his money bag, while turning his head towards Victor as he’s running, he shouts at him.
“Man come on let’s go! You’re only costing us time man! Let’s get the fuck out of here!”
Victor ignores Russell as well. The teller Victor is in front of, continues to empty her drawer. Brian loses patience. He begins to run over from the lobby area, to where Victor is. Brian attempts to forcefully drag Victor. Brian successfully drags Victor away from the teller, by grabbing the back of Victor’s arm. Brian drags Victor towards the bank lobby.
However, the teller placed a dye pack in Victor’s bag. It explodes loudly, the impact causing Brian to let go of Victor. Brian then runs towards the entrance. This also causes Russell and Jesse to run towards the entrance as well. Victor is badly stained with the bright red dye, and drops his money bag, from being startled by the explosion.
Victor then runs towards the entrance of the bank. All four men in a flash depart out of the building, and run to the adjacent parking structure. Kevin who the entire time was keeping an eye out for any trace of them returning, finally sees them approach the van. He unlocks the doors, and starts the ignition. Russell, Brian, Jesse and Victor all enter the van, and Russell shouts at Kevin.
“Kev, get us the fuck out of here now man! Drive this van very fast man! Drive!”
Kevin underneath his mask is grinning heavily, and turns his head to Russell while driving out of the parking structure.
He then happily shouts at him.
“Russ! You guys actually did that shit! Fuck! Yeah baby, Yeah!”
Kevin continues to drive away from the bank, and gets on the highway.
Russell then looks down towards the ground, and shakes his head. Underneath his mask, he has a wide smile.
Chapter 14
NOTHING UP, NOTHING DOWN
Now that the men have completed their first heist, they receive a confidence boost towards their morale. They were able to gain success towards something very risky and dangerous. The heist lasted for about a minute and forty seconds, keeping in mind the goal of them completing the job in a fast and swift time frame. Currently making their escape away from the bank, the men are still in rush of adrenaline and dopamine. It was only minutes ago that were able to rob a bank, and get away with the crime. The pride of knowing they successfully completed their first heist, brings a sense of gratitude towards their emotions. Russell who is now riding in the van back to “Home Base”, starts feeling victorious.
Their first heist is now finished, with thankfully all of them safe. They remain in the van on their way back to their lair, still in shock. One thing that is for certain, they all worked together. Victor disobeyed their original plans however. A teller planted a dye pack in his bag, which exploded all over him. Even with that setback, they were able to get through the heist. All of their worries are now over, as they gloat themselves, for getting away with a perfect crime. At this point they do not know how much money they were able to snatch, but more importantly, they are satisfied of being done with the heist. Looking forward from this point, mentally the men feel proud and determined to use this opportunity as a way to not doubt themselves in the future.
While the men are in the van escaping, congruently back at the “United Farmers Savings” bank, the investigation towards the robbery begins. Five minutes after the guys completed their heist, the authorities are called to the scene. Everyone in the building remains in fear, and in shock from the events. The bank is barricaded and wrapped with crime scene tape. The police start to diagnose the incident, and gather as much evidence as they can. Detective Mike Henderson, who was also the detective in charge of investigation at the “Sunset Credit Union”, arrives at the scene.
Even though Detective Henderson is a kind hearted man at times, he still is devoted to his job. When it comes to armed robberies and bank heists, he’s especially conditioned to change his attitude more seriously. It is remarkable that he is appointed to investigate this bank as well. Likewise, with the “Sunset Credit Union”, this bank also has security problems, which made it an easy target for the men to choose. The detective immediately asks to see the security surveillance video of the robbery. He is directed to the surveillance room, and watches in poor grainy quality the events which took place.
This particular bank has poor video surveillance cameras, similar to the setup at the “Sunset Credit Union.” As he is watching the video, due to the fact the men kept their identity concealed wearing the black outfits and masks, he cannot make out who the men that robbed the bank are. He continues to watch the security video, being amazed at how fast the men were able to rob the bank, and how accurate they were with their decisions and actions. He knows that these men did careful planning beforehand, which explains why they had a near flawless execution towards the heist. They were in the bank for just a little over a minute, performing a very fast job in a short amount of time.
As the detective watches more of the security video, he becomes puzzled when he notices Victor, who along with Jesse were standing in the lobby area of the bank. All of sudden, he sees that Victor walks to one of the bank tellers. He takes more note, when the teller places a dye pack in the money bag Victor used. The dye pack detonated, with the ink getting all over Victor’s arm and hand. The detective who has much experience with dye packs, knows that the ink used in dye packs, is extremely hard to clean.
They leave almost a tattoo like residue on the suspects clothes and skin. Despite the fact Victor was wearing a jacket, it is possible that the ink could have seeped through the fabric quite easily, due to the high power of force the ink exploded, and the material of the dye pack ink as well. The other two tellers were not planning on baiting dye packs in the robber’s bags, but the third teller who is more experienced and has witnessed a lot of bank robberies, wanted to thwart the heist the best way she could at this point, and planted a dye pack in Victor’s bag.
During the robbery, the bank had a moderate amount of patrons inside the bank. It was a Friday afternoon, so this is to be expected. The detective pays close attention to the robbers on the video, trying to see if he recognizes them at all from any past unresolved bank heists in the area. The disguises make this very difficult for him to tell, but he still finds possible ways of identifying who they actually are.
Detective Henderson, then had a feeling that he recognized Brian. He couldn’t pin point exactly from what prior heist he could fit him into, he just had a feeling, and recognized his body shape from under the disguise rather well. He also noticed other features along with that. From the way the robber was holding his gun as well. The detective wasn’t completely sure it was the same person, but it was a feeling that he was perceiving nevertheless. The detective then while he’s observing the security video, wants to know how the robbers got to the bank.
Having concern of knowing what their getaway vehicle actually was. Unfortunately, there is no security cameras of the parking structure the guys came from. However, as the detective analyzes the security footage further, he can tell that the men came in and out of the same direction. This direction was the adjacent parking structure behind the bank.
The detective interviews the bank tellers about the robbers. Teller number one, which was the one that Brian used, explains that the robber was an average bodied man with an energetic voice. Teller number two, the one that Russell used, explained that he was a heavier set man with a deep beastly voice. The third teller, the one Victor used, said the man was slender, and he had a nonchalant calm but loud voice. She also mentioned that he kept shaking his arms nervously. The teller explained that she put a dye pack into the bag, as the robber seemed nervous and not as threatening as the other two were. The fourth robber which was Jesse, the bank employees weren’t able to fully describe him at all. He stayed in the lobby area, and didn’t speak. Because the men were all wearing heavy disguises and masks, witness were unable to describe their facial features.
The detective was frustrated that the men left very little incriminating evidence during this heist. It seems they may have gotten away with this one, and have completed a perfect crime. All hope towards his investigation isn’t necessarily lost. His only salvation, was the fact one of the tellers used a dye pack towards Victor. This would cause his skin to stain from the dye pack very badly, offering a great deal of proof towards the robber’s identity. Also due the explosion, Victor dropped his canvas money bag. This could be a big break for the detective, as far as him collecting evidence from the heist is concerned.
The detective walks over to the stained money bag, and starts to examine it. It was identical, to the same ones that Brian and Russell used. The tote bag doesn’t have any particular designs on it, or any other factor to show where it came from. Victor and the rest of the guys were wearing thick gloves. The chances of fingerprints being left on the bag aren’t very probable. In any case, Detective Henderson asks for the bag to be sent in for fingerprint testing regardless.
The detective then walks outside the entrance of the bank looking for any shoe prints. He luckily does find a solitary shoe print, that was left behind. The shoe print was caused from one of the guys walking through the car oil slicked pavement in the parking lot. All of the guys were wearing the same type of shoes, which were snow boots. The particular print belonged to Victor. The detective asks for the shoe print to be taken into evidence. If the print doesn’t come up as match, it can only be used for future reference. At this point, th
e detective is told that the silent alarms in the bank have been tampered with, after more investigation. Someone using a forbidden software system, disabled the radio frequency of the silent alarm, causing it not to go off. Detective Henderson then understands the robbers were extremely clever messing with the silent alarm system, and timed their execution to use it quite well. Part of him believes there were more parties involved outside of the bank controlling this.
Detective Henderson returns to watching the security video one more time in the surveillance room. Looking at the body language of the robbers, he can tell that the third man who approached the bank teller, was not supposed to do that. From the way the other two robbers; Russell and Victor; looked at him, and the way Brian tried to grab him away, was proof that wasn’t what they originally planned. He takes more notes of the types of guns they used in the robbery.
Not able to come up with the exact type, he takes an educated guess and assumes they were using R4 type assault machine rifles. The detective glances through the video, trying to take anything else noteworthy from the situation. He notices one final thing about the robbery. The detective realized that the third robber reached into his pocket to pull out a canvas bag. This seemed very peculiar and odd to him, and gave him further proof to believe this robber didn’t intend to approach the teller.
The detective finishes watching the security tape, and the tape itself is submitted into evidence. He walks around the bank, still in much disbelief as to how perfectly structured this heist was.
More more police officers begin to leave out of the building, as the investigation starts to conclude. The bank will remain closed for the rest of day, and reopen tomorrow. Detective Henderson, minutes later heads back to the police station nearby to review all of the evidence. The tote bag did not pull up any fingerprints as suspected, but the bag remains in the evidence in case for future reference. The shoe print that the detective was able to get from outside the entrance, did not show up as a match either. However, this as well taken into official evidence for future investigation purposes. Detective Henderson although not satisfied that he wasn’t able to get much information towards the identities of the robbers, was thankful that innocent civilians were not harmed during this incident.
Nothing Ventured, Nothing Gained Page 33