What do you think?

[Tubbs]

I just finished watching a History Channel program that gave a "play by play" breakdown of the North Hollywood bank robbery that took place in the early 90's.
Now, in my opinion they aggrandized a lot of what took place on the side of the bad guys, i.e weapons, tactics used, etc. but it got me thinking about it again. I'm not discounting the tremendous danger faced by LE that day and the courage of their actions, but I think that the media gave those two crooks way more credit than they deserved.
They seem to me to be two assholes that got ahold of some guns, watched too many action movies and thought that they were in a John Woo movie.
Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

[jbour13]

Shootout date was 28 Feb '97. Not gonna split hairs.

They (researchers and the Police) believed that the movie HEAT played a big role in their actions that day. They were also suspected of two other robberies in the area. One took his own life with a Beretta 92 when s**t got too deep, the other was dropped by a high-powered rifle.

The media was left ad-libbing it as it happened but of course began Monday morning quarterbacking it.

The only thing I would say that the crooks earned was suprise.....after it got picked up on by LAPD they showed they were prepared for a hot withdrawl from the bank. But....they didn't have much in the way of contingency planning beyond the banks sidewalk and that's where the bullshitting began by the media.

Facts are facts, boys in blue did one hell of a job reacting and adaptive thinking to sustain life and eventually overcome greater odds, crooks... well they had it coming.

[El Cid]

Originally Posted by jbour13

One took his own life with a Beretta 92 when s**t got too deep, the other was dropped by a high-powered rifle.

High-powered rifle?? I thought the second guy (the one trying to swap from car to truck) was taken out by SWAT with an MP5? The SWAT cops rolled up and shot under the car to take out his ankles. When they moved on him they had to shoot him again at close range to ensure he was not a threat. That part was all on camera and I'm pretty sure that was what I read.

[CoLawman]

Their original successes in this incident were more a result of their superior fire power and the use of body armor. Police arrived with handguns and faced fully automatic weapons. I do not believe the element of surprise had anything to do with it.

The Newhall incident resulted in police departments switching from revolvers to semi-automatics.

This incident resulted in police departments issuing AR15s in stead of the shotgun to their patrol officers.

Just some observations!

[longrange1947]

Just my observation, but if the BGs were so shit hot, why didn't they get away when they had the initial element of surprise and chaos due to their body armor and auto weapons. They were out of their league and was depending on their armor and auto weapons to win when tactics and planning is required to win.

No they were morons and the press again has created their own story just as thye always do when they want to blow shit out of proportion.

My two cents.

[Tubbs]

Originally Posted by longrange1947

Just my observation, but if the BGs were so shit hot, why didn't they get away when they had the initial element of surprise and chaos due to their body armor and auto weapons. They were out of their league and was depending on their armor and auto weapons to win when tactics and planning is required to win.

No they were morons and the press again has created their own story just as thye always do when they want to blow shit out of proportion.

My two cents.

That is exactly what I got out of that. They tried ot make the two individuals seem like they were highly skilled para-military types just because they had some decent firepower.
I get really sick of the media. They also tried to downplay the fact that these were too sick and desparate individuals who chose their actions. They tried to lay most of the blame on the fact that they were able to get ahold of the firearms. Like if they wouldn't have got the guns then they would've been contributing memebers of society.
Last I checked I have a decent sized collection and none of my guns have told me to go rob a bank and try to kill some cops. They heven't put eachother to my head and told me to commmit crimes.

P.S. jbour13, you got to it before I could edit, so thanks for the catch.