Vocabulary expansion. Familiarize yourself with the words and word-combinations and compose sentences of your own.

A hold-up is a robbery where a gun or other weapon is used. Robberies like this happen at gunpoint, or at knifepoint.

The police recommend drivers not to stop at red lights late at night, such is the risk of an armed hold-up.

The driver of the taxi has been robbed at both gunpoint and knifepoint.

Words for a spectacular robbery include heist and raid. A smash-and-grab raid involves breaking a shop window or a showcase to steal things and running or driving away with them very fast. A ram-raid involves breaking through the front of a building by driving into it with a car, and then stealing things in the building.

Thieves broke into the Gardner museum in Boston and stole about a dozen objects worth and estimated $200 million. It was the biggest art heist in the history of the country.

Paintings worth ₤150,000 which were stolen in a smash-and-grab raid from a gallery in London’s West End two years have been found by police.

… a series of ram-raids in the south-east where high-powered cars were driven into shop windows.

Car theft includes joyriding: stealing a car for the pleasure of driving it, often at very high speeds, and carjacking, stealing a car, sometimes at gunpoint, when its driver is in it.

A band of youths ran over a policewoman while joy-riding in stolen car, and police say she was murdered.

The increasing sophistication of car alarms has prompted thieves to take up carjacking, stealing cars while their owners are still in them.

After a robbery, the criminals try to make their getaway or make their escape. Getaway is also often used in the combination getaway car. Robbers may make off with money or property they have stolen: the haul or the loot.

A masked gang forced their way into the Brinks-Mat warehouse at Heathrow and coolly made off with 6,800 gold bars worth more than ₤26 million. The police and public were stunned at the size of their haul.

The gunmen managed to escape. One hour later, the empty getaway car was found abandoned on the edge of a nearby village.

After collecting the cash, the kidnapper made his escape by disappearing down the disused rail line.

The gunmen got away after a high-speed car chase by German police.

If a robbery is foiled, the robbers do not get what they came for, and they may flee empty-handed: they get away, but with no loot. In British English, journalists may refer to passers-by who try to stop thieves making their getaway as having a go. The expression is also used in combination such as have-a-go hero.

He rewarded four ‘have-a-go heroes’ as they became known, who foiled a gang of robbers. They had grabbed a robber and his ₤7,000 haul, forcing his three accomplices to flee empty-handed.

If someone is formally accused of committing crimes, they are charged or indicted with these crimes. An indictment may contain a number of counts or charges. Charges are brought or filed against people accused of doing something wrong, and they then have to face or answer the charges in court. They may agree that the charges are true and admit, or they may say that they are not true and deny them.

Gotti was indicted on 11 counts, including gambling, obstruction of justice and tax evasion.

The authorities have filed charges of arson against the leader of the country’s largest left-wing trade union.

The son of a member of parliament appeared in court to answer charges of drug trafficking.

He admitted charges of forging documents and handling stolen goods.

The rock star Axl Rose from Guns N’Roses denied charges stemming from a riot at a concert in St Louis last year.

Someone who has committed a crime but is not punished is informally said to get off. If they are found guilty, but the punishment is not severe, they are said to get off lightly.

One former National Security Adviser got off lightly in exchange to pleading guilty to withholding information from Congress.

Activity 9. Make the headline fit the crime

Survey pinpoints burglary blackspots	Pickpockets accidentally smear visitors with ice-cream or ketchup, then insist on wiping them down
PC clings for his life to joyrider car	A joyrider sped off with a policeman desperately clinging to his windscreen, a court heard yesterday
City mugger	A gang used a bulldozer to steal a hole-in-the-wall cash dispenser yesterday
Pickpockets cleaning up	A pedestrian was left badly bruised after he was run over by a car and robbed
Hit and run robbery	A schoolboy was robbed at gunpoint by a 9-year old bandit
Boy, 9, in gun hold-up	Burglars smashed their way into a family home by driving through the patio windows
Ram-raid on home	Fourteen British tourists have been robbed of cash and jewellery worth thousands pounds by a gang of French train thieves who sprayed them with a powerful sleeping gas
JCB raiders pull off hole in the wall heist	London’s financial center, the City, has issued an alert to banks and financial institutions around the world after a robbery in which nearly ₤300 million pounds of financial documents, or bonds, were stolen
Cop’s son raided shops	The son of a top Scotland Yard commander took part in smash-and-grab raids which netted a ₤20,000 haul
French gang robs Britons on train	You are six times more likely to return from holiday to find your home has been broken into if you live in a top-storey flat in Glasgow than a five-bedroomed detached house in Aberdeen

Activity 10. Render the article suggested.