No shades, no hats, no robbers, bank says By PRALTE C. PAUL The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Try not to do your in-branch banking on a bad hair day -- at least not at SouthTrust, where tucking unruly locks under a baseball cap is a no-no. The Birmingham-based bank, which has 88 branches in metro Atlanta, has starting asking customers to remove hats, hoods, helmets and sunglasses when entering the bank. Posted signs at bank entrances inform customers of the policy. SouthTrust says the admonition deters would-be robbers, who often wear one or more of the banned cover-ups. A similar program in Massachusetts has met with positive results. Some robbers were caught because -- you guessed it -- they decided to stick 'em up without covering up. "This is a proven crime prevention measure and a proven deterrent," said David Oliver, a SouthTrust Corp. spokesman. "We haven't received any negative feedback." SouthTrust branch managers do have some leeway in enforcement. Customers wearing certain types of cultural or religious dress -- a Catholic nun, an Orthodox Jew, a Sikh in a turban or a burqa-clad Muslim woman, for example -- won't necessarily be asked to remove their head coverings. The "hats off" policy evolved from a test program SouthTrust adopted in Florida about two years ago. Deemed successful, it was rolled out by SouthTrust in January throughout its 10-state southern region. "It is going to potentially inhibit bank robberies, and more importantly, it will produce better imagery from the surveillance cameras," said Ralph C. Thomas, who heads the Federal Bureau of Investigation's violent crimes and fugitive unit in Washington. Nationally, bank robbers average $4,800 per heist, according to the FBI. SouthTrust, which has 119 branches in Georgia, appears to be the metro area's only major financial institution with a "hats off" rule. But given a recent spate of bank robberies in the state, more banks may follow suit. There were nine bank robberies last week in Georgia, including four on Aug. 6 around metro Atlanta. Two of the four were at SouthTrust branches. There have been 245 Georgia bank robberies so far in this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30. The FBI expects the final total to exceed the 251 robberies last year and the 195 the year before. Jeff Holmes, who supervises the FBI's Atlanta violent crimes squad, attributed the rising number of robberies to increased drug addiction, repeat offenders being released from prison and a bad economy. "We've had several cases of people who have told us they robbed banks because they were laid off from work or lost their jobs," Holmes said. Some banks have taken security steps that go beyond counter-to-window bulletproof barriers and security cameras. In recent years, some have added more restrictive measures -- such as having customers interact with tellers only via closed-circuit television -- to deter robberies. This year, Bank of America Corp. launched its "Greenbelt Project" nationwide. Its measures include mantraps -- two sets of double doors equipped with weapons sensors. If triggered, the doors automatically lock, preventing a would-be bandit from entering the branch or escaping outside. Other components are high-tech digital cameras that provide crisper photographs and devices that emit smoke or tear gas. The deterrents have been effective. Between June 2002 and January 2003, robberies of Bank of America branches in metro Los Angeles fell 69 percent, to 24, compared with the 77 holdups between June 2001 and January 2002. "The bottom line was that there isn't a one-size-fits-all solution to reducing robberies," said Brad Dinsmore, who oversees Bank of America's bank branches and mortgage centers in Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina. Bank of America, which has 169 branches in metro Atlanta and plans 40 more, is considering using some of those measures in a few of its local branches. Experts say low-tech deterrents, like SouthTrust's no-hats policy, also are effective. "It's based on a good foundation of the typical bank robber," said Louis Schlesinger, a forensic psychologist at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. "Robbers usually wear some type of disguise." Most bank holdups are planned in advance, with the robber studying a target branch one or more times before committing the crime, he said. "If they realize the security measures are such that they can't wear disguises, it will deter them," Schlesinger said. That's what member institutions of the Massachusetts Bankers Association found when the Boston-based organization established a "hats off" campaign in July 2002. Of the roughly 200 bank robberies that have occurred in Massachusetts since then, only five have been at banks participating in the campaign, association President Daniel J. Forte said. http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/0803/14bankrob.html
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