Robber chased by off-duty officer

Press, 19 September 1985, Page 6

Robber chased by off-duty officer

PA Wellington An off-duty traffic officer, Mr Warwick Macfarlane, went to his bank in Wellington yesterday and ended up chasing an armed bank robber. Traffic Officer Macfarlane was waiting in a queue inside the Te Aro branch of the Bank of New Zealand about 2 p.m. when the man in front of him grabbed money from a teller and raced outside. “I had to do a double-take for a moment, but as he ran out I ran after him,” he said last evening.

Two male bank staff followed Traffic Officer Macfarlane on to the footpath and chased the man in

Cuba Street. The man was caught about 200 m away near the Michael Fowler Centre by Traffic Officer Macfarlane and one of the bank staff. “We got him down and I sort of sat on him,” Traffic Officer Macfarlane said. The man threatened them but was told that he would be hit with a soft-drink bottle that Traffic Officer Macfarlane carried throughout the chase if he tried to escape.

A police patrol car arrived in minutes and the man was taken to the Wellington Central Police Station for questioning.

Detective Sergeant Mervyn Theobald, of the Well-

ington C. 1.8., said a man, aged 24, was later arrested on a charge of aggravated robbery. A woman, aged 22, was also helping the police with their inquiries. Just under $lOOO taken from the bank had been recovered, he said. A weapon was carried in the incident but the police declined to say what it was. The bank’s security manager, Mr Graeme Dallow, said that a recent policy adopted by the bank meant that tellers carried “very little cash these days.” He declined to comment on the robbery as the matter was before the courts.