Cops and robbers

The temptation to romanticise a huge bank raid should always be resisted. That was, and still is, one of the worst aspects of Britain's celebrated "great" train robbery of 1963. Yes, it did need daring, skill and military teamwork to effect false signal lights, cut telephone wires and efficiently transfer £2.6m in old notes (equivalent to £40m today) from train to truck to remote farm house. But there were also the injuries inflicted on the driver to consider, his early death, and the outrageous extra sums the robbers received later for book and film rights.

One danger of this week's £22m robbery of the Northern Bank of Belfast is the Peter Sellers element of a gang who found themselves facing more money than they expected, which they were unable to cart all away. But this latest robbery was not a comedy but a ruthless, well-executed operation in which two families were held hostage for over 24 hours as two bank employees were taken away and forced to give the gang access to the vaults the following night.

The new robbers will face more problems than the 1963 gang, who found they faced huge discount rates when cashing in their booty and had to come up with enormous fees to pay people off to keep quiet. Laundering old notes, even in an era when launderers were less sophisticated, was easier work than with this week's new notes, which form the bulk of the haul, and whose serial numbers will be known and easier to track. Worse still for the robbers, the Northern Ireland currency is not legal tender (like Scottish notes) and is only accepted, even in Northern Ireland, by custom and practice. The robbers may be lucky to get 10% of the value and perhaps as little as 1%, unless there is a link to corrupt exchange agencies.

Given the local knowledge the robbers exhibited, an international terrorist gang looks unlikely. This leaves the politically vital question of whether the perpetrators were paramilitaries or organised criminals, though the distinction is largely lost in Northern Ireland. There is a long-established pattern of disbanded paramilitaries turning to organised crime. An estimated £43m was stolen in more than 22,000 armed robberies during the Troubles. The latest crime dwarfs these thefts.

Ironically, the robbers will also face an illegal cash market saturated with drug money, plus an economy where cash now plays a minor role to credit card purchase.Bad luck? Not likely. The public should remember the trauma two separate families have undergone. This crime should not be trivialised or romanticised.