5 B of A Branches Robbed in One Hour: ‘Just Another Day in L.A.’

Five Bank of America branches were robbed within an hour of one another in Los Angeles on Tuesday, reinforcing the city’s reputation among law enforcement officers as the nation’s bank robbery capital.

Authorities said the holdups were unrelated and might not have garnered much attention had they not occurred in such rapid succession and involved branches of the same bank.

“It was just another day in L.A., really,” said FBI Special Agent Scott Bontsema, summing up a day that saw 10 bank robberies in the Los Angeles area, up from the usual daily total of seven.

The FBI said that through last week, there had been a record 1,483 bank robberies in the area, up 27% from the same time a year ago.

“There are any number of theories about why there are so many,” Bontsema said. “Some say it’s linked to gang activity, others to the economy. Nobody really knows.”

No one disputed, however, that Tuesday was a bad day for Bank of America. In addition to the five branches robbed within the space of an hour in the early afternoon, a sixth branch was robbed later in the day. And among the non-Bank of America offices hit, one was a Security Pacific branch. The two banking giants recently merged.

The Bank of America robberies began at 12:41 p.m. when three men ran into the Olympic-Western branch and ordered tellers to empty their cash into a gym bag, Los Angeles Police Detective Dennis Frealy said. The robbers escaped on foot after crashing a stolen car two blocks away. At 12:56 p.m. the bank’s East Hollywood branch was robbed, followed by a Westwood branch at 1:16 p.m., the Wilshire Center branch at 1:19 p.m., and a Van Nuys branch at 1:43 p.m., authorities said.

Two of the day’s robberies were so-called “takeovers” in which people jumped over counters and demanded cash, police said. The other holdups involved a single robber, they said.

Several of the robbers said they had weapons, but none were fired, authorities said. “For the most part these aren’t professionals,” Bontsema said. “They’re your garden variety crooks.”

Spate of Robberies Five Bank of America branches were robbed in a one-hour period in Los Angeles on Tuesday. (Another five were robbed elsewhere in the L.A. area, slightly more than usual, according to authorities.) 1. 3320 W. Olympic Blvd. 2. 4975 Melrose Ave. at 12:55 p.m. 3. 1101 Westwood Blvd. at 1:13 p.m. 4. 3442 Wilshire Blvd. at 1:19 p.m. 5. 14701 Ventura Blvd. at 1:40 p.m.