Bank Money Shields: Workplaced Victimisation, Moral Dilemmas and Crisis in the Bank Profession

Abstract

This paper discusses the experience of Brazilian bank employees who have been victims of armed robberies and related crimes such as bank robbery and extortion-related kidnapping. The research is based on 42 interviews with bank employees (18) and their spouses (3), bank security officers (7), bank health officers (6), employee union representatives (5), a bank representative (1), a journalist (1) and a police officer (1). It also draws on 30 medical reports on employee victims, 236 newspaper articles and police statistics. We show that employee kidnappings are used to facilitate robberies and carry out extortion while circumventing security devices and confrontations with the police force. Given that employee kidnappings for the purposes of robbery and extortion occur outside the workplace but aim at resources kept inside the bank, they challenge notions of workplace violence as an experience restricted to the work environment. We discuss the threats and quandaries produced in the victim-offender encounter and the politics of shifting responsibility onto the victim. We demonstrate that the experience of being victimised and being held responsible by the bank increases fear of crime among employees, undermining their self-esteem, disturbing their social network, and negatively affecting their profession. We advocate that law enforcement be improved and that banks both invest in security equipment and review the current policy of worker responsibilisation.

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