“MAN with toy gun in £1000 bank raid”, read the Evening Times splash headline on April 11, 1972. A bearded man had held up a branch of the Bank of Scotland in the city centre’s West George Street, waving a Luger-type gun and screaming “Get down on the floor” at staff. He ordered them to fill a briefcase with money, which he then grabbed. He escaped, followed by staff, but they lost him in the lunchtime crowds. The man was then thought to have darted into a building in Hope Street. The area was cordoned off as detectives and dog-handlers scoured the building. They eventually found the toy pistol and the raider’s coat, hat and briefcase.

One eyewitness in the bank said the man had told staff: “Hurry up. I am getting very nervous. I have only got five minutes left.” Another said: “People were crouching on the floor and the bank staff looked scared.”

Glasgow CID chief, Detective Chief Superintendent James Binnie said some witnesses had got a good look at the man. The next day, a man appeared in private in court, accused of robbing the bank of £2,500 using an imitation Lugar pistol,