Authorities have released surveillance footage of a man who robbed an Alexandria BB&T Bank branch.
The robber entered the branch at 233 S. Van Dorn St. around 5:20 p.m. Friday, Alexandria police said. He approached a teller, implied he had a handgun and demanded money. The robber left with an undisclosed amount of cash and fled on foot. No one was injured.
He is described as a black male, about 5 feet 7 inches tall and unshaven, police said. He was wearing light-colored pants, white tennis shoes and a long, black T-shirt. He had on a dark-colored Chicago White Sox baseball cap with the word “Sox” in white lettering running vertically down the cap’s front.
According to national bank robbery statistics recently released by the FBI, robbers are more likely to threaten being armed than actually display a weapon. In the last three months of 2008, 465 robbers pulled out a firearm during a robbery. But in 696 other cases, the robbers only implied they had a gun.
It’s also rarely the case that anyone in the bank is injured during a robbery. Most banks train their employees to comply with a robber’s demands, the FBI said. In the last quarter of 2008, only 26 people were injured in the 1,645 bank robberies nationwide. Sixteen of those injured were employees, two were customers, and the remaining were the suspects and guards.
During that same time period, Friday was the most likely day of the week for a bank to be ripped off, with 340 robberies, the FBI statistics said. Monday was the second favorite day for bank robbers, with 321.
Anyone with information regarding the BB&T robbery should call Alexandria police at 703-838-4444 or the FBI Washington Field Office at 202-278-2000. For more information about bank robberies in the Washington area visit bankbandits.com.
