OPINION: Mistakes make most robbers easy prey for cops
An article that appeared in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle this week with the headline, “Defendant Collected More Than $22,000 from Three Banks,” confirms what a police supervisor once told me about most street criminals: “Most criminals commit crimes on the spur of the moment, out of opportunity, and don’t take much time to think their crimes through.”
In other words, most criminals are more akin to a street thug who notices a closed store, picks up a brick and smashes the window than they are to the “master thieves” who pulled off the Great Train Robbery in Britain or the $5.8 million Lufthansa Robbery at JFK Airport — not to mention such legendary figures as John Dillinger, Butch Cassidy, Jesse James and Bonnie and Clyde.
The article reveals how this particular Brooklyn bank robber followed a distinct pattern in all his robberies: “Each time, he allegedly gave the bank teller a hand-written note, written in the same pen, on the same type of paper with identical wording, including misspellings. The defendant demanded money and said he had a gun. He never spoke. In addition, Rodriguez consistently wore a hooded black full length “North Face” coat with logo.”