The World - News from June 9, 1988

Two Brazilian bank robbers finally made their getaway with $98,000 and three hostages but left behind $19,000--in what they called a token of thanks--in the small-town bank they had held for nearly a week. Police gave in to the bandits’ demands for $117,000 on Saturday but then dragged out negotiations in an apparent effort to wear them down. The last of 37 hostages in the Banco do Brasil office in Goio-Ere--600 miles west of Rio de Janeiro--were released in exchange for a flight to freedom with three volunteer hostages, a pilot, a priest and a nun. The robbers sent the plane and the three volunteers back to Goio-Ere after disembarking at an airstrip a few miles from the Paraguayan border.