Armed robbers claim their victims enjoy it

NEXT time you find a gun pointed at you by a robber in a building society, don't take it personally. He may believe he's doing you a favour.

According to researchers at Leicester University, some armed robbers believe their victims actually enjoy being at the centre of a heart-stopping drama. 'Gives 'em something to talk about,' was a common response among 341 convicted robbers when interviewed for one of the most comprehensive studies on criminals and crime ever undertaken.

The collective research, published as 14 chapters in Crime at Work: Studies in Security and Crime Prevention, is being seen as a groundbreaking piece of work because it draws on the experiences of criminals and former criminals to show security experts in banks, building societies, shops and offices how to prevent crime. Among the subjects looked at by a team of researchers were ram-raiding, insurance fraud, shoplifting, commercial burglary and fiddling in hotel bars.

Dr Martin Gill, editor of the collection, was responsible with his colleague, Dr Roger Matthews, for interviewing hundreds of convicted robbers in dozens of prisons during a two-year period. They found that stiff sentences do not deter armed robbers because none of those interviewed thought they would be caught.

Instead, the robbers cited difficulties in making their escape as the main reason they chose one bank or building society over another. The researchers also found out that most robbers tend to use a real gun - not a replica - but that there is rarely an intention to use it. They fear anything or anyone that might hamper their escape but, surprisingly, many favoured banks with security screens. Far from seeing the screens as protecting staff, they felt the screens gave them protection from the staff.

Another piece of research by Dr Gill, Adrian Woolley and Karen Gill was designed to find out how widespread insurance fraud was.

'We had to catch people at a time and place when they wouldn't be afraid to admit to defrauding their insurance company,' Dr Gill said. 'In the end, we chose ferries because people were stuck on the boats for several hours and they felt anonymous.'

The researchers found that 10 per cent of people admitted to inflating their last claim, although 50 per cent said they knew someone who had fiddled a claim, suggesting the total is probably higher than 10 per cent. They also found that while 50 per cent of people thought it was acceptable to make a personal phone call from work, 13.8 per cent believed it was fine to ride on public transport without paying; only 2.1 per cent thought it was acceptable to steal a chocolate bar; and 23.8 per cent believed it was all right to inflate an insurance claim to cover the policy excess.

Among the other surprising findings in the book is the discovery that most ram- raiders crash into shop windows not for excitement, but simply for money. In his ram-raiding research, Christopher Jacques found that local authorities are exacerbating the ram-raiding phenomenon because they refuse to grant planning permission for metal shutters, on aesthetic grounds.

Dr Gill said: 'There has been a lot of interest from the retail and banking industries because the book tells them where they are going wrong, straight from the horse's mouth.'