The cafe was relatively quiet as I, dressed in a suit, sat at an empty table. I placed my briefcase on the table and waited for a suitable victim. Soon, just such a victim arrived with a friend and sat at the table next to mine. She placed her bag on the seat beside her, pulling the seat close and keeping her hand on the bag at all times.
After a few minutes, her friend left to find a restroom. The mark [target] was alone, so I gave Alex and Jess the signal. Playing a couple, Alex and Jess asked the mark if she would take a picture of them both. She was happy to do so. She removed her hand from her bag to take the camera and snap a picture of the “happy couple” and, while distracted, I reached over, took her bag, and locked it inside my briefcase. My victim had yet to notice her purse was missing as Alex and Jess left the café. Alex then went to a nearby parking garage.
It didn’t take long for her to realize her bag was gone. She began to panic, looking around frantically. This was exactly what we were hoping for so, I asked her if she needed help.
She asked me if I had seen anything. I told her I hadn’t but convinced her to sit down and think about what was in the bag. A phone. Make-up. A little cash. And her credit cards. Bingo!
I asked who she banked with and then told her that I worked for that bank. What a stroke of luck! I reassured her that everything would be fine, but she would need to cancel her credit card right away. I called the “help-desk” number, which was actually Alex, and handed my phone to her.
Alex was in a van in the parking garage. On the dashboard, a CD player was playing office noises. He assured the mark that her card could easily be canceled but, to verify her identity, she needed to enter her PIN on the keypad of the phone she was using. My phone and my keypad.
When we had her PIN, I left. If we were real thieves, we would have had access to her account via ATM withdrawals and PIN purchases. Fortunately for her, it was just a TV show."