Officer Shoots Bank Worker at Robbery

A Culver City police officer accidentally shot a bank employee in the ankle Wednesday during a search for two robbers who slipped out of the building and carjacked an escape vehicle across the street.

Dressed as security guards, the two men armed with a revolver and a semiautomatic handgun forced their way into the Bank of America in the 3800 block of Culver Center Street about 8 a.m., an hour before the bank was to open, as an employee inside unlocked the door for a co-worker.

Culver City police, responding to two silent alarms, arrived as the robbery was in progress. The robbers locked the employees in a second-floor room that houses the air-conditioning controls and fled to the roof, said Lt. Bill Burck, spokesman for the Culver City Police Department.

The two gunmen raced across a skywalk connected to a nearby Thrifty store roof and jumped 22 feet onto the ground, leaving $20 bills fluttering in their wake. Authorities have not determined whether they got away with any money.

Police, who did not see the escaping robbers, entered the bank in search of them. As officers gained entry to the room where the bank employees were locked up, an officer accidentally shot one of the victims in the ankle, Burck said. Police had no information about why the officer fired.

The shooting is under investigation, Burck said. The unidentified woman was taken to Brotman Memorial Hospital in Culver City, where authorities said she was in good condition.

Meanwhile, the robbers dashed across the street and hijacked a car from a woman pumping gas at a self-serve gas station.

The robbers headed east on Venice Boulevard in the stolen car, a 1990 champagne-colored Chrysler LeBaron, which was recovered near Crenshaw and Adams boulevards Wednesday afternoon.

The gunmen were described as African Americans. One is about 5 feet, 10 inches tall, in his early to mid-20s and wearing short, tightly braided hair. The other is described as about 6 feet tall, 25 to 30 years old with short hair. The “uniforms” they wore consisted of white shirts with security guard patches on the sleeves and black pants.

Bank of America is offering a reward of up to $50,000 for information leading to their arrest and conviction.