Police have arrested an assistant manager and a security officer from the same state bank branch in Horana in connection with the Rs.30.5 million cash bag robbery on June 3, confirming insider involvement in what had been described as a daylight grab outside the branch.
Ada Derana reported that the two bank employees were taken into custody as the Western Province North Crime Division advanced its investigation into the snatch, which occurred at around 2.55 p.m. on Wednesday. A bank worker was carrying two bags of cash through the rear entrance of the branch when “an individual arrived, forcibly snatched the cash bags, and fled the area,” the broadcaster said. The stolen money was being transported to be loaded into the bank’s automated teller machines.
NewsFirst, which described the incident as a Rs.35 million theft following an earlier higher police estimate, said a suspect had also been arrested in connection with the case and that Rs.17 million of the stolen cash had been recovered. The Island, reporting on Saturday, confirmed the stolen amount as approximately Rs.30.5 million — the figure police are now using — and said the cash had been prepared for distribution to ATMs and transportation to other branches when it was taken. The newspaper said the brazen daylight robbery had raised concerns over the security procedures used during the inter-branch movement of large sums of cash.
Police Spokesman SSP F.U. Wootler had originally told reporters the theft involved two bags of cash being moved between state bank branches when an attacker on foot approached, grabbed both bags and fled. The arrests of two staff members from inside the targeted branch mark a significant escalation, pointing investigators toward potential coordination between bank employees and the suspect who took the money.
The robbery is one of the largest single-incident cash thefts reported in Sri Lanka this year and follows a string of governance shocks in the banking sector, including the Rs.13.2 billion NDB fraud and the Treasury US$2.5 million email-fraud breach. Further investigations into the Horana case are continuing.
Update — June 6: The Acting Horana Magistrate on Saturday evening issued a six-day detention order on the Assistant Manager, allowing the Western Province North Crime Division to continue questioning him in custody, Ada Derana reported. The security officer was remanded until June 11. The two suspects were produced before the bench after the police investigation team completed initial questioning.
Update — June 7: Police on Sunday said the case is now being investigated as an alleged internal financial fraud rather than an external robbery. The Assistant Manager, taken back to the branch for further questioning, is reported to have given a detailed statement on how funds were allegedly misappropriated. Investigators say he diverted bank money over an extended period to cover interest payments on personal borrowings from multiple individuals and to invest in private business ventures including mining-related activities. As the officer responsible for replenishing the branch’s ATMs, he is also alleged to have consistently entered lower-than-required cash amounts into the system while retaining the difference for personal use — a practice police believe continued for a long period and went undetected in the absence of a recent full-scale physical audit. Authorities now say no evidence has emerged to support the claim of an armed external robbery and suspect the incident may have been orchestrated as a cover for the alleged internal misappropriation.
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