Bank Boss Robbed at His Own ATM

June 28, 2001 9:11 am EST

EDINBURGH (Reuters) - The multi-millionaire chairman of one of Europe's largest banks was robbed at one of his own automatic teller machines after falling for a cheap street hustle, a bank spokesman said on Thursday.

Sir George Mathewson, chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland and a pillar of the Scottish financial establishment, was drawing some cash from a central London machine when two conmen approached him from behind.

They carefully noted his personal ID number and waited for the machine to spit out his card, before tapping him on the shoulder to tell him he had dropped a five-pound note ($7.07).

The canny Scot's natural instincts kicked in and he bent down to pick up the supposedly spilled money, whereupon his assailants reached over to grab the bank card and ran off.

A spokeswoman for the Edinburgh-based bank said Sir George was left red-faced but unhurt and never actually lost any money.

"They didn't get any access to the account. Sir George alerted the police straight away and stopped the card," the spokeswoman said.

[Put him on the Darwin award list, please.]

-- Anonymous, July 01, 2001