MACHINE-GUN BATTLE

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1052, 16 August 1930, Page 22

MACHINE-GUN BATTLE

BANDITS IN GERMAN CITY A DRAMATIC CHASE The main street of Leipzig, where at that time thousands ot foreign business men, including many hundreds from Great Britain, had assembled for the great international fair and exhibition, was the scene of a dramatic chase of armed bandits by police and fire brigades in motor-cars. The bandits, who had shot down and robbed a bank messenger of his bag containing £750 in cash, kept up a running fire from their revolvers, injuring two of their pursuers. Finally, after their own high-powered racing motor-car had been disabled by the machine-gun shots of the police, they succeeded in escaping in a tramcqr with their booty. Police Cordons * For the present the Leipzig police have lost all trace of the bandits, but extensive cordons are being formed in the surrounding districts, and the Berlin police have been called in to co-operate. The attack on the bank messenger, which took place in a crowded place in the centre of the city, was witnessed by hundreds of people. Herr Goldacker. the messenger, had just left his bank, and was walking down the street when a brown sports model motor-car suddenly drew up opposite him. Three masked men jumped out and, pointing their revolvers at him, cried: "Hands up!” Before Herr Goldacker could comply with their demand, however, each of the three men fired at him, hitting him in the stomach and leg. He fell, and from his prostrate figure the ban dits snatched the bag, jumped into their motor-car, and dashed off. All the motor vehicles in the street at once joined in pursuit of the bandits. Other motor-cars going in the opposite direction tried to stop them. The bandits’ motcr-car, however, which was subsequently found to have been stolen from the Marquis lie Feronda, the Secretary of the Spanish Embassy in Berlin, was too quick for them, and, dashing skilfully in and out of the motor-cars and carts which tried to block their way, the bandits succeeded in escaping.

A passing ambulance wagon of the fire brigade took up the chase. tThe bandits, however, when the ambulance got perilously close to them, opened fire on it, and after hitting the car 15 times, injured one of the occu pants and succeeded In puncturing the radiator, so that the ambulance was unable to proceed. A group of navvies at work in one of the streets next tried to hold up the gunmen with a hastily-constructed barricade. The robbers, however, fired on the workmen, one of whom they injured seriously, and without reducing their speed, dashed through the barricade, which they wrecked. The police motor-car now joined the

chase, and with a machine-gun opened fire on the bandits’ car, which in turn was soon disabled and brought to a standstill. Tramcar Escape The gunmen, however, succeeded in jumping on to a passing tramcar, of which they immediately took command. One of the bandits pointed his pistol at the head of the driver of the tramcat, and took his place at the control, driving the car at a frenzied speed through the streets, while the other two bandits held up the conductor and passengers with their pistols. When the police motor-car, w-hich had been badly delayed through a collision with the bandits’ wrecked motorcar, at last caught up with the tramcar, the bandits were no longer in it.

They had tied up the driver and conductor, and leaving the tramcar, with its terrified load of passengers, to career driverless through the streets, they jumped off and made their escape.