The Preemptive Draw and Preemptive Grip in the Cash-in-Transit Sector. Part 1. – Guts, Gates, & Guards.

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The Preemptive Draw and Preemptive Grip in the Cash-in-Transit Sector. Part 1.

By Edwin Torres. June 23, 2026.

Armed and Ready 2009, photo used with permission of photographer Danny Nathan

I have always been interested in history, including the development of firearms, but an area that does not seem to get as much focus is the development of tactics. There’s a particular set of tactics within the private security industry which I first noticed years ago. Taking a trip down memory lane to 2016, I recall seeing this on my first day working as an unarmed security guard for a small bank branch while on one of my very first security assignments.

I witnessed an armored Ford pick truck belonging to one of the major cash-in-transit companies pull up to the front of the bank. I saw the messenger exit the truck, set a handcart on the ground, and draw his firearm out of the holster while he pulled boxes of coin out of the truck and dropped them onto the handcart with his free hand. I then observed him reholster his firearm and roll the handcart into the bank with a relaxed demeanor as if he had done this countless times.

Now this may have seemed odd to many people, but I had actually seen this being done before, simply not in person. I had seen old photos of armored truck crews performing similar actions, as well as in Hollywood films. I later became reacquainted with this tactic two years later in 2018, when I began working within the cash-in-transit sector for a different major company. Although it was not used at every stop, nor by every employee, I did observe my co-workers performing similar actions, gripping their firearms or drawing them out completely during certain moments on the job.

Now I don’t know if anyone has come up with a specific name for these practices before, but I have decided to refer to it as the preemptive draw and preemptive grip of a firearm in the cash-in-transit sector. It is characterized by an employee in a cash-in-transit role (the term increasingly used globally to refer to what we in the US call the “armored car industry”) routinely drawing or gripping their firearm, without the presence of a specific threat.

Now this article is not intended to discuss the legality of this tactic in your jurisdiction, or whether it is tactically sound. Instead, it will analyze the documented history of this tactic, primarily from sources in the US and Canada, which demonstrates that this is not simply the random choice of a few cash-in-transit employees; rather, it is a well established practice going back over 100 years to the earliest days of the use of armored automobiles to transport money and other valuables

Beginnings

During my research, one of the most valuable books I read was Bulletproof, by James L. Dunbar, founder of Federal Armored Express and son of the famous founder of Dunbar Armored, George Dunbar (now a part of Brinks). Also cowritten by author and journalist Robert Grant Kingwell. Take a guess at how quickly I came across the preemptive grip… page 1. This book brought me to the very beginnings of the industry. I will explore some quotes from the book in later sections.

Dunbar claims in his book that Michael E. Sweeney of the Sweeney Detective Bureau, a former St. Paul Police lieutenant turned security company owner, was the first to invent the purpose-built, money-transporting, armored automobile in 1919. In my research, I discovered that the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago had already commissioned the construction of and used a “bandit-proof truck” earlier in 1919, and that David Bellamore had already filed a patent for an “automobile bank vehicle” all the way back in 1910! Still, Sweeney did play a major role in commercializing the armored car as a service. His company was eventually bought by Loomis in 1967.

The predecessors of the armored car industry can be traced to the Wells Fargo Express stagecoaches of the old west and the lesser known bank messengers who would travel on foot, sometimes armed, carrying cash deliveries to their customers within cities.

The Documented History

The main source of my research came from Google’s News Archive. It is a great searchable tool that contains scanned images from thousands of newspapers and magazines from around the world. You may notice that I include only portions of the articles. This is to respect copyright and only include portions of publications for the purposes of commentary. This list is by no means a full list of every reference to the preemptive draw/grip, but I wanted to include at least one reference from each decade going back to the 1920s to the 2000s. Also I would like to add, there are many different terms to refer to cash-in-transit crew members, and I use the term, guard, and messenger interchangeable, as do some of the sources.

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