Region VII had most bank robberies in 07

Central Visayas had the most bank robbery incidents in 2007 based on records from Camp Crame, a police official here said.

Based on the data obtained from the Police Regional Office-7, in 2003 until the end of 2004 the National Capital Region topped the list in bank robberies with a record of 20 and 19 incidents, respectively.  Central Visayas only recorded two in 2003 and one in 2004.

In 2005, bank robbery incidents in the NCR went down to five cases but Region IV-A recorded an increase of 19 cases, Sr. Supt. Augusto Marquez of the Regional Intelligence Division of the PRO-7 theorized that the perpetrators in NCR moved to Region IV-A, while in Central Visayas on the same period, the police recorded four incidents.

In 2006, police from NCR and Region IV-A increased police operations that led to the decrease of the robberies to eight for Region IV-A and two for the NCR, while in Central Visayas only one was recorded.

The Luzon regions (NCR and Region IV-A) have maintained their thrust against these robbers in 2007, and managed to record only one bank robbery in their respective regions.

Surprisingly, Central Visayas did not.  This was when the group of Casimero Garcia or the notorious Garcia robbery group staged several robberies including banks in the Region.  PRO-7 recorded six incidents last year while NCR has one and the Region IV-A had none.

These robberies happened mostly in Metro Cebu, these included the Peninsula Rural Bank in Mandaue City on August 21 and the Anchor Savings Bank robbery on February 6.

This was followed by another robbery in Minglanilla in March 28 where robbers at gunpoint took P293,053 from the Bacong Rural Bank.

In the middle of the year, the Garcia group entered Cebu and staged their own robberies causing the police to improve security and send more policemen on the streets.

In June 29, Cebu Public Savings Bank was robbed by men pretending to open an account who took P476,944 cash, this was followed by a robbery of an armored van collecting money from La Nueva Supermart in August 13 where P3 million was taken and a guard was shot dead.

The last incident happened in the Bank of Commerce Tagbilaran branch in Bohol in August 28. Garcia’s group managed to take P90,000 and killed a security guard in the shootout.

The group was eventually arrested one-by-one during follow-up operations.

Most of these banks are rural banks that were not members of the Cebu Bankers Association.  Compared to banks under the CBA, rural bankers do not have adequate security measures to protect their businesses.

CBA members have already established their own security measures and systems to protect their establishment in cooperation with the local police. — Edwin Ian Melecio/BRP