A dubious honor

The Vancouver city police announced,today,that the city is number one in bank robberies committed.This will come as no surprise to any one that's been on the inside of the drug scene in the city in the past 40 years.I can remember friends telling me how the excitement when you leave a bank with a bag full of money and face the unknown outside the door it's better than a good fix.These were people that you'd never expect to rob a bank.They were non-aggressive and usually pretty mellow guys that always had real burners for drug habits.It's amazing how the worse your habit is,the more willing you are to procrastinate or delay things until there's just nothing for it but to make a rash move.People that rob banks are overly generous with the money they have and because they usually have such a growing and ever more vicious drug habit,they are constantly either planning a job or waiting to do one.Of course with each successive robbery it becomes more difficult to figure a way ahead of the law.Eventually,one of the partners is a tad more wired than the others and this results in a solo effort that is spur of the moment and usually not a good idea.As each member gets busted,the heat goes up on the rest.In the end they all have at least one current charge and are under 24 hr surveillance which leads to every one going down hard.The cops are handing out purses(change),that say :"bank robbers always get caught".They just don't get it that criminals just don't factor in the odds before committing a crime.A heroin addict,often as addicted to the rush of robbing a bank as they are to the drugs just don't think it's too much of a risk.Compared with the consequences of not robbing the bank and being as sick as they know they'll be is just no contest.Sure they'll get popped eventually.They just want to have a really good time before they go down.I didn't say it was going to make sense.It's just the way it is in a city that's always been a gateway city with lots of good heroin and a whole lot of people that do it.I could say that prohibition doesn't work but I'm assuming most of you already know that.