The Norco Bank Robbery and Shootout (May 9, 1980)
On May 9, 1980, five masked gunmen stormed a Security Pacific Bank branch in the small horse-ranching town of Norco, California, touching off a violent confrontation that would become one of the most extraordinary criminal pursuits in American law enforcement history. What began as a routine robbery escalated into a running gun battle across Riverside and San Bernardino counties, leaving two robbers and a sheriff's deputy dead and thirty-three police and civilian vehicles wrecked or destroyed. The incident permanently changed how California law enforcement agencies trained and equipped officers for high-risk confrontations.
The Robbery Begins
Shortly before 4:00 p.m. on May 9, 1980, five heavily armed men wearing ski masks entered the Security Pacific Bank on Hamner Avenue in Norco, a quiet Riverside County community better known for its equestrian trails than violent crime. The robbers carried an arsenal that included semi-automatic rifles, handguns, and homemade explosive devices, and at least one pipe bomb was left behind as a diversion. As they gathered cash from the tellers, an employee managed to trip a silent alarm, and Riverside County Sheriff's deputies began arriving within minutes. When Deputy Glyn Bolasky pulled into the bank parking lot, the robbers opened fire immediately, catching him in a hail of gunfire that struck his patrol car and severely wounded him, ultimately costing him an arm. The ferocity of the initial exchange stunned responding officers, who realized almost at once that they were dealing with something far more dangerous than a typical bank heist. The gunmen fled the scene in a stolen truck, spraying gunfire at pursuing patrol cars and setting the stage for a chase that would stretch across dozens of miles and draw in law enforcement from multiple jurisdictions before the day was over.
Did You Know?
During the chase, the robbers hurled homemade pipe bombs from their truck to slow pursuing police, a tactic rarely seen in American law enforcement history. Deputy Glyn Bolasky, wounded in the initial shootout at the bank, lost his arm but survived and later became an advocate for officer safety training inspired by the incident.
A Running Gun Battle Across Two Counties
What followed was a harrowing pursuit that carried the robbers from the streets of Norco into the rugged foothills near Lytle Creek in the San Bernardino Mountains. Along the way, the gunmen fired hundreds of rounds from automatic and semi-automatic weapons at the growing convoy of pursuing police vehicles, while also hurling pipe bombs onto the roadway in an effort to disable their pursuers. Officers from the Riverside County Sheriff's Department, the California Highway Patrol, and several municipal police agencies joined the chase, and a police helicopter was brought in to track the fleeing suspects from above. During the pursuit, San Bernardino County Sheriff's Deputy James McPherson was killed after his patrol vehicle was disabled and he was fatally shot in the ensuing firefight. As the chase pushed into the mountains, one of the getaway vehicles crashed, and the robbers scattered on foot into rugged terrain, exchanging gunfire with officers who surrounded the area. By the time the shooting stopped, robber Manny Delgado had been killed, and ringleader George Wayne Smith later died from injuries sustained in the confrontation, while the remaining suspects were eventually captured after an extensive manhunt.
Aftermath and Lasting Impact
In the wreckage left behind, thirty-three police and civilian vehicles had been damaged or destroyed by gunfire, explosives, or collisions during the chase, an astonishing toll that underscored the scale of the confrontation. The surviving robbers, including brothers Russell and Christopher Harven and George Smith's remaining accomplices, were later tried and convicted for their roles in the robbery and the deputy's death, receiving lengthy prison sentences. The Norco shootout forced a reassessment of tactical readiness among California police departments, prompting many agencies to adopt patrol rifles and heavier body armor to counter the kind of firepower the robbers had deployed, a shift that foreshadowed debates repeated after later high-profile shootouts such as the 1997 North Hollywood bank robbery. Deputy Bolasky's harrowing survival and recovery became a symbol of the dangers faced by first responders confronting heavily armed criminals. Decades later, the events of May 9, 1980, were revisited in documentaries and true-crime retrospectives, cementing Norco's unlikely place in the history of American law enforcement as the site of one of the most violent and consequential bank robbery pursuits ever recorded.