Following the posting of the Hummel figurine yesterday, Carole and others have asked me to explain further my arrest for Armed bank robbery by the West Berlin Police.
Here goes, it's a long story .............
One afternoon in December 1987, I caught the U-Bahn from Olympic Stadium Platz (around the corner from where we lived) into West Berlin city centre with the sole intention to go to the KaDeWe on Kurfürstenstrassé and buy a Hummel figurine for Carole’s Christmas present.
From what I can remember, I think I had been on nights and had had around 4 or 5 hours sleep and Carole was working days in the military hospital; Not a problem, I'd be home way before she was. But then I promptly fell asleep on the U Bahn and had to get off a couple of stops later; not a problem, West Berlin is pretty much grid squared and I knew to walk from where I alighted the U Bahn to the street where the KaDeWe was.
It was cold, very cold and deep snow lay on the ground; in typical German fashion, the pavements had been cleaned, gritted, salted and the snow was heaped on the pavement edges by the roadside kerb. As I got to the Kurfürstenstrassé, I suddenly found myself lying facedown in a heap of snow having been barged out of the way by a man coming out of a building, who just ran off without a by your leave or a "Es tut mir leid" (I'm sorry). Back in my twenties, I was not known for my calmness or keeping my temper and as this guy ran off up the road I found myself running after him.
I was aware of folk diving out of his way, diving into doorways, hiding behind cars but as to why I had no idea, I was just haring after this guy who had knocked me to the ground and as we got up to the KaDeWe, the man jumped into a cream coloured Mercedes taxi (they were all cream coloured Mercedes in West Berlin) and the taxi driver dived out of the drivers door leaving it open making it possible for me to dive in. Seconds later, 2 West Berlin police officers are pointing their guns at me, babbling in German and I found myself pinning a strange man under my body in the footwell whilst holding a plastic bag that I later found out to contain around DM400,000 (then worth around £1,400,000 ($1,900,000)) and in my other hand a pistol.
To them, and to anybody else that could see, tt obviously wasn't a good look.
Minutes later I’m handcuffed in the back of a green and white Berlin police van, in a small cage, asking myself “how the hell are you going to get out this then Phil” with the man I’d “caught” glaring at me from his cage with looks that were less than friendly.
We arrived at the West Berlin Police Headquarters, in the American sector, where we were searched, photographed, fingerprinted, had our belongings removed and placed in a cell, together; the looks again from my ‘partner in crime’ were not at all welcoming or friendly.
At this time, the Police Officers had obviously gone through my wallet, found my British Army ID Card and had had their hierarchy call the British Military Government to say they’d arrested a British Soldier for Armed Robbery. The British Berlin Government immediately dispatched a commissioned officer, a German linguist, who happened to be a Major from my Unit to the Police HQ and at the same time as he arrived, a Store Detective from the KaDeWe also turned up with a VHS Cassette from the their security system which he said the Police needed to see. They obviously watched it as not long after I was taken from the cell, taken to the head of West Berlin Police office where I met the head of the West Berlin Police Force (who had been called in on his day off), the Major and the store detective and heard lots of very fast German coming at me which was translated to me as lots of apologies.
What the footage of the VHS cassette showed was the bank robber running up the road with his plastic bag of loot, firing his gun at the crazy Englishman who appered completely oblivious to the gunfire, who was basically chasing after him to get an "Es tut mir leid” for being barged head first into the snow drift as he exited the bank.
When I got home, Carole was already home (well I kind of got delayed) and all she knew about it was that she had received a message from my OC to call him. So I did and she heard what had occurred whilst I briefed my Officer Commanding. Needless to say, and quite understandably, Carole was not impressed and I think she may have said something along the lines of “your temper is going to kill you one day.”
A week or so later I received a letter from the Berliner Volksbank (the bank that had been robbed) inviting me to come down. My shift commander gave me the night off and the transport took me down to the bank where I gate crashed their Christmas party, was presented this 1oz Gold Sovereign (worth around £2600 (approx $3600) today) and DM500 (then around £1750 ($2370) in cash as a reward. A report of my escapade was published in The Times, the local paper to my home and in the Berlin press and I took a great deal of ribbing from my colleagues within my Unit.
So there’s the story of my arrest for Armed Bank Robbery in West Berlin in 1987. (It took me until 1995 when I deployed to Bosnia with the UN to calm down temper-wise, but Carole may dispute that). I remember a chat with one of my Warrant Officers not long after the event who kind of said "there's a fine line between bravery and stupidity Phil, and I think on this occasion you crossed it." He was probably right.
Anyway, that’s how I happen to be the owner of this Gold Sovereign...........
Well done! You deserved that gold sovereign!