Ray Whitehouse Photography

I heard about a robbery at a nearby bank on the police scanner this afternoon. This was no ordinary robbery, though.

First off, the robber only stole $20. The officers didn't go into much detail about the logistics of the theft on the radio and it left me curious how one would enter a bank and steal just $20. I still have yet to come up with a plausible explanation.

The second uncommon aspect of the robbery was the venue choice. The thief robbed a bank .3 miles from the Greensboro Police Department. Robbing a bank so close to the GPD would decrease the response time and thus limit the escape time a thief had. Very curious.

Third, the thief was reported to have left on foot. The odds of outrunning the GPD with only a .3-mile head start just seem so small that it wouldn't even make sense to try.

My boss, News and Record Photo Director Rob Brown, sent me out to see if there was anything newsworthy and picture-worthy.

When I arrived at the bank, it vaguely resembled a scene in the movie The Blues Brothers. There were at least five cop cars and 10 officers standing around the bank that had just been robbed of $20.

I spotted a police dog in a nearby field trying to pick up a scent. No luck.

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I returned to the bank and walked around the perimeter. There wasn't much going on so I made the decision to drive around the neighborhood and see if any other nearby GPD officers had made any progress in finding the thief. I saw a cop head down Textile Drive and make a right onto Yanceyville Street. I followed.

As I made the right, I was greeted by another set of cop cars parked in a line with flashing lights in the right lane. Then I saw five police officers talking with a man in handcuffs and inspecting his belongings. I was .7 miles away from the crime scene. This must be an arrest in relation to the $20 dollar robbery, I thought. I made some pictures at the scene including this one:

I headed back to the paper after the GPD put the handcuffed man in a police car. Mr. Brown liked the image and wanted to run it in the paper. Unfortunately, within two hours of making this picture, the GPD said the arrest I photographed was unrelated to the robbery.

My inferences about the arrest were incorrect. I was left with more questions than answers. Most pressing among them:

Who was the person I actually photographed?

What crime was the suspect accused of?

And lest we forget: The mystery of the thief who stole $20 from a bank .3 miles away from a police station remains unsolved.