Recession robberies of banks on the rise
Financial pressure pushes some people over the edge
Published: May 11, 2009, 12:30 am
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COLUMBIA, S. C. — Bruce Windsor lived the life of a respectable family man — father of four, deacon in his South Carolina church, youth soccer coach, a volunteer who helped build orphanages in Brazil. Then four days after his 43rd birthday, authorities say, he donned a mask, wig and sunglasses and tried to rob a bank at gunpoint.
Windsor, it turns out, was falling down a financial hole. A real estate investor who ran several property business, his troubles predated the recession but continued as the housing bubble burst and easy credit for businesses and consumers dried up.
Clad in an orange jumpsuit, his hands cuffed at his waist, Windsor calmly told the judge at his bond hearing, “I’ve never stolen anything in my life.”
Windsor is one of a growing list of unlikely suspects, ordinary people from ministers to ex-cops, citing financial duress since the start of the recession in late 2007 for allegedly turning to a crime that targets fast cash — bank robbery.
Industry figures show that bank holdups go up during recessions, and experts say the pressure inevitably pushes some otherwise law-abiding people to find themselves accosting a teller at a window.
“I would expect, as the downturn continues and lasts well over a year, that we will see more and more cases like this one, of someone without a record feeling they have no options and turning to crime,” said Richard Rosenfeld, a criminologist at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.
The latest FBI statistics tallied 1,617 bank robberies in the fourth quarter of 2008, up from 1,358 in the third quarter and 1,561 a year earlier, although there are no statistics that differentiate between first-timers and repeat criminals in bank heists.
Cases that have been in the news besides Windsor include a Georgia minister, an ex-cop in Florida and a single dad in St. Louis— all blaming dire financial straits for their arrests.
James Creason, a 51-year-old music minister at a south Georgia church, was arrested in August on charges he used a handgun to force tellers to hand over $36,000 at a bank where he was known and where his ex-wife had worked. Authorities say Creason was caught after a brief car chase and told them he was sorry and had fallen on hard financial times.
Creason is being held without bond until his trial. His attorneys have said they plan to pursue an insanity defense.
In Ohio, retired bank teller Barbara Joly was sentenced in February to nine years in prison for robbing four banks. Her attorney, Chris Atkins, said the crimes were attempts to support an adult son who’d fallen on hard financial times. Joly and her husband decided they couldn’t afford to give their son any more of their own money, so she robbed the banks to continue to help him financially.
In January, Donald Keith Giammanco was charged with robbing 12 St. Louis banks from November 2007 through last September. The unemployed, single father of twin teenage daughters told police he stole more than $100,000 to provide for his children. He had filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in September 2007.
In South Carolina, Windsor filed for Chapter 7 protection in 2005, a year after he was handed more than $83,000 in fines in five separate lawsuits involving debt collection and contract disputes. At the time, he listed just over $3,000 in assets, with debts totaling more than a quarter-million dollars. A foreclosure case was dismissed, and a lawsuit filed in January over breach of contract is still pending.
Windsor remains in jail, unable to pay the $3 million in state and federal bond set on charges including armed robbery and kidnapping. If convicted on all counts, he could face more than 60 years in prison.
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