https://voicesofignacio.cvlcollections.org/files/original/50ea85ad24331df9b3ff35658f308fab.jpg f44fea20cd0593a471a46c07a71fa0be https://voicesofignacio.cvlcollections.org/files/original/741a280c08c42d5477ff0c7f65361d81.mp3 700be3f617acef54c6e666c5799acc0f https://voicesofignacio.cvlcollections.org/files/original/7e64cc10e92831d6f105c84359f87a6f.pdf 04e4f8ae3aa99df48d6011ef7d5521ac PDF Text Text The Bank Robbery By Rosemary Aiken This story is true and based on the facts as I remember them. It was high noon on a hot, summer day, Monday July 3, 1989. The bank lobby was crowded with customers at the Norwest Bank in Ignacio, Colorado. There was quite a buzz of conversation and you could hear a baby crying. I was a loan officer at that time and had left my desk on the south side of the bank and went behind the teller line to our documentation vault. As I was leaving the vault, I noticed the teller to the left of the vault motioning me to stay inside. I backed into the vault and a minute later a teller walked past the door. A masked man had her by the arm and was holding a pistol to her back! She was carrying a sack and I saw her empty the cash from the teller drawer into that sack. The robber was wearing a floppy, brown hat and a bandana covered his face. They walked back past the vault and I lost sight of them. The thoughts that went through my mind were swift. My first thought was to become invisible so he couldn’t see and shoot me. Then I thought, “No, it’s a joke. It’s not really happening.” Then I thought, “I wonder if I could sneak up behind him and hit him over the head with our check protector or one of the metal boxes containing our money orders and cashier checks. That thought left as quickly as it appeared. I remained in the vault for a few more minutes and I noticed the deadly quiet that had overcome the bank. The baby had even stopped crying. The robber again passed in from of the vault door, but this time he had a different teller. I later found out he had asked the first teller if she had a car and she wisely said, “No.” That was not so lucky for the second teller who he grabbed. He told her to get her keys. The only male employee, also a loan officer, got up from his desk and walked across the lobby and started talking to the robber. The robber kept shouting at him to shut up and go sit down. He finally told the employee, “If you don’t want blood all over the bank, you’ll sit down and shut up.” As stated before, I finally saw the bank robber and the teller pass in front of the vault door. They headed out the side entrance of the bank. When they were out on the sidewalk the robber asked the teller where her car was. At that point the teller realized she had grabbed her teller window keys and not her car keys. They could not re-enter through the side door because it locks when it is closed. The front door was also locked by a bank employee as soon as they left the bank. There was an old Dodge pickup idling outside where the robber and teller had exited and he forced the older couple out and forced the teller into the truck. Morbid curiosity had made a couple of us look out the side door and we saw them race away and head south on highway 172. We later realized how stupid we were to look. He could have decided to start shooting at us! �The Ignacio Police Department is just a half block north of the bank. We later learned that one of a police officer had started running down the street to the bank, pistol in hand, tripped and fell and the loaded pistol went flying down the sidewalk. Much later we laughed at how that was something Barney Fife would have done on the Andy Griffith Show. Before the bank was locked a male customer had left the bank and got into his truck. When the robber sped past heading south, he followed, a safe distance behind. When the robber got to the top of the hill by the Ignacio Cemetery, he slowed down and ordered the teller out. She later told me she was shaking so hard she couldn’t find the door handle. The robber then reached across her, opened the door and pushed her out. The bank customer, who was following them, picked her up and took her back to the bank. The first responder, after the robbery went out over the radio, was a Southern Ute Tribal Wildlife officer. He came upon the abandoned truck just a mile or so past where the robber had dumped the teller. The robber was running across an open field to the east of Highway 172. The officer took aim, but because another vehicle was heading towards Ignacio, and was in the line of fire, chose not to fire his gun and put others in jeopardy. Several minutes later there was an exchange of gunfire and another officer said all he could remember was bullets whizzing past his head. The robber was not captured that day, but was apprehended sometime later in Abiquiu, New Mexico. He was brought back to La Plata County, stood trial and was sentenced and placed in the Colorado State Penitentiary. The male loan officer kept telling me after the robbery and before the robber was captured, that he recognized the voice, but just couldn’t place it. I guess it was kind of like watching an animated movie and not being able to place the voice until after the final credits are being rolled. We also found out that customers had recognized the hat the robber was wearing as it belonged to his wife and she always wore it around town. About nine years later, the teller that was abducted in the robbery was contacted by the FBI and was told the robber was being released. I am now the manager of the bank, so I called my FBI contact and he confirmed that the robber was getting out of prison. He also told me the robber could not come into the bank or contact any bank employees. I have been told he still lives in the Ignacio area. Another bank robbery occurred several years later. But, that story will have to be told at another time, by another employee who was actually there, because I was retired by then. And I’d like to tell you a few fun facts or two fun facts about the bank… When I first stated working at the bank our shipment of cash from the Federal Reserve Bank in Denver was mailed from them to our post office. The postmaster would call us to let u know now it was there. Two bank officers would walk across the post office, while a third employee would watch from the inside of the bank. Now an armored vehicle with armed guards delivers the cash from the Federal �Reserve. I guess, since it is a federal offense to rob the post office, that’s why it was originally shipped by mail. They figured it was the safest way to get to the bank. Also, after the robbery, the entire lobby area was remodeled. The teller line was moved to the south side of the bank, next to the cash vault and totally enclosed in walls and locked doors. If you would like to pursue this robbery story, I’m sure the Durango Herald has archived all of what happened during the robbery, what happened during the trial and what happened after he was released. Transcribed by Liz Wheelock February 2016 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Voices of Ignacio Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource "The Bank Robbery" by Rosemary Aiken Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/</a> Subject The topic of the resource Bank Robbery; Ignacio; Colorado; 1989; History Description An account of the resource The written summary of a bank robbery that took place in Ignacio, Colorado on Monday, July 3rd, 1989 by an employee that worked at the bank at the time named Rosemary Aiken. Type The nature or genre of the resource Text