MASKED MAN AT BANK

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 10, 7 October 1936, Page 6

MASKED MAN AT BANK

Manager’s Pluck DEFIES INTRUDER A middle-aged man, with a black handkerchief tied round the lower part of big face, and carrying a sawn-off gun, attempted to rob the Northbridge branch of the Bank of New South Wales, in Sailor Bay Road, but the manager (Mr. A. J. Jefferey) frightened tlie thief away by running for the bank revolver. The man escaped without stealing anything. The attempted robbery occurred at 12.10 p.m., when Mr. Jefferey was alone in the bank offices. “Just after Mr. G. C. Hardwick, the teller, left for lunch.” said Mr. Jefferey, “I was sitting behind a partition when I heard someone enter and stop at the counter. I walked toward the opening leading to the counter enclosure, and I was confronted by a man. His eyes were barely discernible under his hat, which was pulled low down on his forehead, and over the lower part of his face was a mask resembling a black handkerchief. Both the man’s elbows were resting on the counter, and he was holding what looked like a sawn-off shotgun. Both hands were clutching the gun, and the barrel -was pointed straight at me. “Bank Surrounded.” “I said, ‘What’s your game?’ and the man replied, ‘lt’s all up. You had better stand as the place is surrounded.’ “All this happened in a few seconds. When I saw the gun levelled at me and heard the threat, I jumped behind a partition and then ran quietly into my room, still concealed behind a partition from the man. With the bank's loaded revolver in my hand I ran back to the door leading to the residence part of the bank and called to my wife that the bank was being held up. “ ‘Get the police,’ I shouted to her. My wife ran out at the side entrance and told a neighbour, Mr. J. J«bnston, and they ran to the corner and g4ve the alarm. The North Sydney police were telephoned, and when I looked in the bank again and then out in the street the bandit had gone.” Henry C. Haddon, whose parents conduct a grocery store on the corner, saw the man. Haddon had been to a garage further down Sailor Bay Road, and when he was driving back past the bank he saw the man walking hurriedly out of the bank. There was no mask on his face then, and Haddon did not see any gun. At the time he was unaware of the attempted robbery.

“The man walked across the road.” said Haddon, “to a taxi painted yellow. The driver of the taxi had been reading a newspaper and as the man got into the taxi the driver threw down the paper, and drove off in the direction of Willoughby. The man I saw leaving the bank was fairly well dressed, in a brown suit. He was about 38 years of age.” Detective-Sergeants Sadler and Mackie, and Detectives Windsor and Watkins were at the bank about 15 minutes after receiving the report. No arrest has been made. Residents of the locality stated that a taxi-cab had been cruising about the vicinity for some days, and that before the bandit entered the bank the taxi was observed being driven along Sailor Bay Road. It is believed that the robbery was planned to take place when the teller had gone to lunch, and Mr. Jefferey was alone in the bank. There was a large sum of money at the bank at the time.