Les Jones: Life Imitates Art, Heat-Style, in Norway

April 06, 2004

True Crime > Life Imitates Art, Heat-Style, in Norway

1081153444.30596.jpg Yesterday a gang of six robbers hit NOKAS, Norway's regional cash service, using body armor, gas masks, automatic weapons, and tear gas. They used a truck filled with gas containers to block exits, and burned cars as they left with the loot. The gang wounded and killed a number of police, and fired indiscriminately at bystanders. Link.

Heat is the Robert De Niro/Al Pacino/Val Kilmer movie about an LA gang that robs a bank in broad daylight and shoots it out with the police. It inspired the Bank of America robbery in North Hollywood in which robbers wore body armor and used fully automatic weapons against police who were badly outgunned.

I read an article in either Esquire or GQ by a guy who had been a customer in a bank during an armed robbery. He eventually interviewed the guy who robbed his bank that day. It turned out that the bank robber and his gang always watched Heat the day before the robbery to get psyched up, which is kind of odd, considering that the gang in the movie loses the gunfight.

Posted by lesjones

Comments

Did the guys in the movie lose the gun fight? Two out of four got away with 2/3 of the loot. And a lot of cops died. Only one of the guys was actually killed in the main gun fight on the street ( the unarmed driver). One was wounded, but got away. One was eventually chased down and killed.

Posted by: Ron at April 07, 2004

Depends on how you look at it, I guess. 50% losses are pretty bad. I wouldn't play Russian roulette with a gun that had bullets in half the chambers.

Posted by: Les Jones at April 07, 2004