Linas Jegelevičius
In an impudent strike, gangsters blew up the door of a Maxima supermarket in the 5 500-habitant southwestern town of Kazlų Rūda and robbed an ATM on Monday (14 November) night.
Kazlų Rūda is a town some 120 km west of Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital.
Presumably, the ambush took only a couple of minutes and unofficial sources have told several Lithuanian media outlets that the ATM was semi-full of cash.
According to the Kaunas Fire Rescue Board, a report of the incident on Valančiaus Street came in at 03:44 am. The incident triggered the introduction of the Shield plan, which mobilizes various police units and is used at a time of a security emergency.
«They poured a gas mixture into the ATM and, after blowing the ATM up, stole the cash cassettes containing money,» Ieva Šlivinskienė, a spokeswoman for the Marijampolė County Police, told local newswire.
The explosion that rattled the entire town shattered the windows of the supermarket and even damaged the roof.
Aras Grabauskas, commander of the «Aras» anti-terrorist operations team, has said that no explosives or dangerous items were found at the site during the inspection in the wake of the explosion.
Meanwhile, Tomas Bašarovas, spokesman for Maxima, said after the incident that the store had to be temporarily closed.
«There were no casualties, the store was closed at the time of the robbery,» he said.
Maxima said later it has determined that the building’s essential structures were not damaged in the explosion and that the store resumed operations on Wednesday, November 16.
Joana Zubrickė, the chief specialist of the Communications Sub-section of Marijampolė County Police Commissionerate, was later quoted by media as saying that the robbers did not need to rob the ATM itself – they only took away the cassettes in which the bills were stored.
Investigators did not say what amount was stolen.
Meanwhile, SEB Bank, whose ATM was blown up, says that the money in the ATM has been sprayed – marked with an unwashable dye, so the criminals will not be able to use it
According to the portal lrytas.lt, the loot of criminals can amount to several tens of thousands of euros.
The criminals managed to escape faster than the police and security service personnel arrived. The thieves were probably wearing masks during the assault, so as not to expose themselves to the video cameras.
It is also believed that they could have used a stolen car or stolen license plates. The authorities have opened a criminal case for large-scale theft, and the search for the bombers is underway, the police have said.
Following the attack, the issue of security in the town and in the entire country was raised by many. Like many other Lithuanian towns, Kazlų Rūda is dimly lit amid the energy crunch.
Kazlų Rūda Mayor Mantas Varaška-Pelakauskas resorted to social media, condemning the heist plotters and addressing security concerns.
«I emphasize that the reduction of street lighting (switching off at night from 1 am to 5 am) corresponded to the Government’s energy-saving plan. Secondly, it was supported by 96 percent of the population in a survey organized by the municipality. Besides, the light restrictions in Kazlų Rūda are shorter than in other cities where lighting is restricted/switched off between 11 pm and 7 am,» the mayor said.
The mayor, however, acknowledged that, after this crime, the decision not to illuminate the city at night is to be «reconsidered.»
In his words, a crime of an unprecedented nature like this is not just a robbery, but also an assault on the public due to the unpredictable consequences in the case of the use of powerful explosives in the center of a town.
The police will monitor the general security situation in the city/settlements, for the time being, he said.
However, some of the mayor’s opponents used the incident to criticize the mayor for what they called «insufficient safety» in the town.
Yet in general, blows-up of ATMs in Lithuania is a rarity. The last time such a crime took place was last summer, when on the night of 15 June an explosion occurred in a supermarket in the town of Alytus in southern Lithuania. After breaking into the Luminor ATM, the as-yet-unidentified criminals stole the cassettes with banknotes within 1-2 minutes.
On 3 November, 2021, an ATM was blown up in a shopping center operating in the Vaišvydava settlement of Kaunas, but that time the robbers’ plans went awry – they ran away before they could take the money.
In May-August 2017, three ATMs were targeted in Kaunas, two attempts were successful.
Lithuanian police say the majority of crimes of this type usually go undetected by law enforcement. Criminals are able to cover their tracks well, wear masks, do not leave fingerprints, and get rid of ATMs and cassettes in forests or other remote areas. It is also difficult to find witnesses.