Saigon police hunt two armed bank robbers

By Quoc Thang   December 8, 2018 | 12:05 am PT
Saigon police hunt two armed bank robbers
Police inspect a VietABank branch in HCMC after a man escaped with VND1 billion Friday. Photo by VnExpress/Tran Duy
Two armed man robbed VND1 billion ($42,900) from a bank in Ho Chi Minh City’s Binh Thanh District Friday, police say.

Cameras caught a man barging into a branch of VietABank on Dinh Tien Hoang Street and threatened a security guard, three employees and a customer with an unidentified gun.

He forced employees to put VND1 billion ($43,000) in cash into a bag, before spraying tear gas and escaping on a motorbike. The robbery lasted three minutes.

Camera footage shows the man was approximately 1.7 meters tall, wore jeans, a red and white helmet, gray-white sport sneakers and a mask. His motorbike was a brown Honda Dream.

No one was hurt in the incident, said Tran Tien Dung, deputy director of VietABank, who also said there were two men involved in the robbery.

Witnesses have also reported seeing two men flee the bank, but one of them was not caught on camera; and no other information about him or his role in the robbery has been released.

Dung said all the money in the bank was insured so all customers’ rights are guaranteed.

Bank robberies used to be rare in Vietnam but have been reported more often since last year.

Last September, a man was arrested several days after robbing VND945 million ($42,000) from a Vietinbank branch in the Mekong Delta's Tien Giang Province.

In the same month, police in the central province of Khanh Hoa arrested two men who robbed an branch of Vietcombank and escaped with nearly $130,000 in cash.

 
 
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