'Robbing a bank not like the movies', Northern Bank trial told

"Robbing a bank is not like the movies, you do not need dynamite", the judge hearing the £26.5m (€33m) Northern Bank robbery trial said today.

Mr Justice McLaughlin made the comment when the banker forced to deliver the cash to the robbery gang outside the doors of the bank Cash Centre in the heart of Belfast agreed with the defence lawyer that it had not been difficult to get the huge sum of money out under the noses of security guards.

Assistant bank manager Kevin McMullan said: ``It was easy to take £26.5m (€33m) outside to a van on the street, yes. We disguised it as rubbish.''

The judge interjected: ``It's not like the movies, you don't need dynamite.''

Mr McMullan responded: ``You just need to take someone's wife away from them.''

On his fifth day in the witness box at Belfast Crown Court Mr McMullan continued to be cross examined on his evidence that bogus police officers forced their way into his home in the middle of the Co Down countryside on a Sunday night in December 2004, snatched his wife Kyran and said if he did not facilitate the robbery she would die.

The case will continue tomorrow.