Series continues

Bank robbed in Innsbruck: Perpetrators on the run

This savings bank branch in Innsbruck's Reichenau district was robbed again on Friday morning.

(Bild: Johanna Birbaumer/Johanna Birbaumer, Krone KREATIV)

Again! The series of bank robberies in Innsbruck continues. On Friday morning there was a robbery at a Sparkasse branch in the Reichenau district, which had already been robbed in July. The perpetrator managed to escape.

The police helicopter circles over the Tyrolean capital, patrol cars with flashing blue lights race through the city, sirens can be heard everywhere: At around 11.40 a.m., a previously unknown man stormed into the Sparkasse branch in Reichenauer Straße. "He was masked and armed with a pistol, threatened two employees and demanded cash in German," said the police. One of the employees finally put the demanded money, which had just been counted, into the bag carried by the perpetrator. The stranger then left the bank and fled on foot in a southerly direction. The loot was foreign currency (American dollars, British pounds and Swiss francs), although the amount of the loss is not yet known.

The police have published these mugshots.

(Bild: Polizei)

Police ask for tips
A manhunt has so far been unsuccessful. Nothing was initially known about any casualties or possible loot. The perpetrator was described as corpulent. He is around 25 to 35 years old, around 1.70 to 1.80 meters tall and was wearing a black visor cap, trousers, jacket and a black face mask. He was also wearing black and white shoes. The police are asking for information (phone [phone]).

The robbed savings bank branch in Innsbruck's Reichenau district.

(Bild: Johanna Birbaumer)

The ninth robbery in Tyrol
In Tyrol, and particularly in Innsbruck, eight bank robberies have already taken place within a year. Several perpetrators have since been arrested. According to the public prosecutor's office, a duo arrested at the beginning of July after a bank robbery in Innsbruck was also suspected of being responsible for two further robberies at bank branches in the provincial capital in March and April. The LKA also investigated connections to robberies in Kufstein in January this year and November last year.

68-year-old exposed as bank robber
At the end of August, a 42-year-old Slovakian was also arrested after an armed bank robbery in Mieders in the Stubai Valley (Innsbruck-Land district). Just a few days earlier, a 68-year-old Austrian was caught after an armed robbery at a savings bank branch in Reichenau in July. He had previously sped away on an e-scooter. Meanwhile, a perpetrator was still on the run after a robbery at a cashless bank in Innsbruck at the beginning of September.