Bank robbery,hostages taken

They choose you.
What would you do?
Myself,I’d fake an epileptic episode… Never let “Them” take you to another location.

Or just fainting. Alternative, if you happen to have a loaded rectum at the time, is to deliberately shit your pants; the perp will have a hard time keeping you anywhere near him if he’s constantly gagging and wretching. You will be too, but you’ll also probably come out of it alive.

Bank robbery? I’d let them go ahead and take me and wish them good luck not get taken out by the SWAT team. Bank robbers generally don’t try and take hostages unless the police are already there. When they do take them before the police arrive it’s generally in the mistaken belief that it will delay the bank from calling the cops which is BS because the banks hits the silent alarm as soon as there is any sign of a robbery.

Now a car jacking, I’m jumping out of the car or throwing the keys and some cash behind them and run the other way.

I’ve actually thought about this question a lot, not in the context of a bank robbery but in the context of conflict zones. I know 5 or 6 people who’ve been taken hostage and I think about half managed to get released, while the others were killed. Of the survivors, most of them seemed to have some really bad experiences that haunt them. One Iraqi I worked with had a couple of mock executions and he never seemed the same afterwards.

I think I’d try to make as much noise as possible and try to fight off getting in the car, but that’s easy to say. I think a lot of times it happens when you’re not expecting it and by the time you realize what’s happened, you’re in too deep.

…Seems like the math would be pretty easy to do there.

Take out the robbers with a bank pen chain, escape through the air ducts.

I know self-defense, and I would fight. Never let them take you to another location is a good idea.

And then there is the theory where you don’t upset a desperate person holding you at gunpoint. I’d say that bank robbers aren’t looking for someone to rape or torture but for someone to use as a shield. Bad idea on their part, but then again these people are not thinking clearly. You would be better served to keep them calm. Once they commit a robbery and decide to take a hostage they are looking at major jail time anyway, so making it difficult for them may just push them into choice to just shoot you because they are going away for a long time anyway. Again, they are not thinking clearly.

Yeah, it’s easy to do in my office in Bethesda, but on the streets of Kabul with people screaming at you, putting a gun in your face I think there is a strong inclination to do what the nice man in the mask with the AK-47 wants and get in the trunk like a good boy.

In this scenario you definitely fight tooth and nail if possible.

And then they kill you point-blank. I guess if you’d rather die than be a hostage, fighting/running makes sense. Otherwise, I wouldn’t recommend it.

I don’t have statistics on whether fight, flight, or submission is “best” in a hostage situation. But most people would let themselves be taken. Unless you’ve had a gun pointed at you before, it’s not a situation that theory can prepare you for.

One of the women was thrown from the car,the robbers killed one,the other was badly injured and shot in the police chase/crash.
2 of the robbers were killed,one badly injured

ask them what movies they’ve watched. then decide.

When I was a bank teller a hundred years ago we were trained by ex-FBI guys on how to handle big robberies and branch takeovers. The instruction I got was to “avoid being taken hostage at all costs”. The idea was that they’d use you as a shield and then kill you. Which is exactly what we saw in the Stockton robbery/kidnapping yesterday.

I agree with others above that that’s a great philosophy, but if someone is holding a gun on me, I pretty much do exactly what I’m told. At least, the couple of times it’s happened I certainly complied with the gunman’s instructions. I don’t think I have the yuks to look at some guy with a big ol’ weapon and just flat refuse.

The hostage who was killed was used as a human shield by the robbers. There’s still a question as to whether she was killed by police or by the robbers.

It’s going to be awhile before they know. The local paper has several articles and a blog post related to the robbery.

You’re all missing an important point: there’s no reason to set foot in a bank unless you work there.

I’d tell them I’m legally blind (which I am) and that I’d be a pain in the ass for them to lead me around, through no fault of my own.

Unless, like me, you want to deposit cash and don’t trust ATMs, since the last time I deposited cash into an ATM, they lost it.

Talk to someone who’s actually been involved in an armed robbery. All those things you tell yourself you’re going to do…they go out the window when your feet feel like they’re cemented to the floor and you forget how to talk. Most people aren’t going to be saving the day, regardless of what they think they’ll do in all the times they’ve gone over it in their head.

Shit, I was lucky I remembered how to dial 911.