If You Ever Wondered Who Names the Bandits, Meet . . .

Meet the LAX Bandit. He is a grandfather with a penchant, authorities say, for robbing banks in communities near Los Angeles International Airport.

And the Groucho Marx Bandit. This mustachioed character has a nose so prominent that witnesses in banks he has robbed throughout Riverside County swear that he is wearing a plastic gag mask.

Now, consider the holdup artist who crafts atrociously spelled demand notes announcing, “This is a rabbry” and warning bank tellers not to “pull anytrix.” He has been dubbed the Post-Graduate Bandit.

Finally, meet FBI Agent Bill Rehder. He dreams up the nicknames for the desperate cast of characters who have made the Southland the bank robbery capital of the world.

The numbers make Rehder a very busy man, bestowing monikers on hundreds of serial holdup artists--men and women who rob bank after bank until they are caught.

With a well-schooled observation and a quick turn of phrase, Rehder, 49, and other investigators transform an unfamiliar suspect into a virtual household name among law enforcement agencies across Southern California.

Authorities reason that it is a lot easier to remember some criminal as the Don Johnson Bandit than as a better-than-average-looking white male wearing baggy, pastel suits.

The lineup includes The Nerd. Baby Huey. The Mummy Bandit. The Troll. The Shamu Bandit. Miss America. Miss Piggy. The Pervert. The Shadow.

Star-conscious Los Angeles also has its celebrity look-alikes. The Tina Turner Bandit. Arthur Ashe. Reggie Jackson. Don Johnson. And the Michael Jackson Bandit, who always robs wearing the same black glove on his left hand.

“It’s amazing but some of these people really do bear a likeness to the celebrities,” said Rehder, a 23-year veteran of bank robbery investigations. “You just hold up their bank surveillance photograph and say to yourself, ‘Now who does he look like?’ ”

The nicknames do not always bring quick results. While the LAX Bandit--a 64-year-old Manhattan Beach grandfather--was arrested shortly before Christmas--the Groucho Marx and Post-Graduate bandits remain at large.

Investigators say the names help them keep better track of the rising number of repeat bank robbery offenders--and maintain their sanity as well.

“It’s just a stressful job,” said Lawrence G. Lawler, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles bureau. “We once had 26 bank robberies in a single day. There’s some states that don’t make that number for an entire year.”

Within hours after a bank surveillance camera does its job, the resulting grainy black and white photos--most showing furtive-looking men stealing away from a teller’s window--become the trump card in Rehder’s name game.

The crooks are tagged for their extraordinary looks--or for what they do or say once inside the bank.

The Clearasil Bandit was named for his pockmarked complexion. The shaggy-looking Pervert was so dubbed because a teller said he looked like he had just walked out of an adult bookstore.

The thorn in the side of bank robbery investigators is no doubt the Shadow.

A burly man in his early 40s, he has robbed banks on and off in Los Angeles for the last six years without getting caught--a gambler who authorities say has definitely beaten the apprehension odds.

“He’s been at it so long our bank photographs show that his beard has begun to gray,” Rehder said. “But we’ll catch up with him, eventually. We always do.”