Two tragic holiday season bank robberies, both of which occurred in Arkansas, served to crystallize, in period of a few days and in one state, some trends we have seen nationally in 2006 in bank robberies.
The first trend is that both robberies could have been prevented by the use of entrance control devices such as those provided by Hamilton Safe, Nova Comm and others. These systems have proven time and again to be a very cost effective means ensuring armed robbers cannot enter a branch. In the case of the recent robbery at the First Western Bank in Caulksville (Fort Smith), Arkansas it would have prevented the robber from pistol-whipping a client as reported in The Morning News and on KCTV5 News the Kansas City CBS affiliate. In the more tragic shooting death of 25 year old James Garrison at the Metropolitan National Bank branch at 10300 Rodney Parham, Little Rock, Arkansas full story from Fox News affiliate an access control doorway would have saved a life.
The second trend that these incidents bring to light is that bank robbers are usually serial criminals and quite often bank robbery recidivists. This was clearly the case in the First Western robbery full story from KCFM. The father/son team had robbed a bank in Jane, Missouri on two separate occasions NWANews.com Original Story. If that bank, a branch of Hometown Bank had used bait money with an embedded radio device such as those provided by Spectrum Management's Electronic Tracking Service (ETS) or 3SI Security Systems law enforcement officials may have been able to prevent the bank customer from being assaulted. The capture and recovery rate for financial institutions that have upgraded from traditional dye-packs to the electronic tracking solutions is significant.
Fortunately it seems that a team comprised of local police, county sheriffs and Arkansas State Police where able to capture the father and son before anyone else was hurt. As so often is the case with bank robberies, they are the work of serial criminals. In this case the father/son team not only robbed other banks, and committed assault; they stole cars to commit their crimes.
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