It took a collaboration of workers and community members to stage a big April Fools’ Day joke today on a bank president in Montezuma. Sandy Ross, a teller at the People’s Savings Bank, says one of the girls looked up pranks on the Internet and they came up with the idea of getting some yellow police “Crime Scene” tape and putting it up inside the bank. Before long they expanded on their idea, and decided to really make it look like the scene of a bank heist. One of them laid down and outlined her silhouette in tape, so it looked like there’d been a dead body there, and they scattered some money around and made little signs saying “April Fools.” Then, they enlisted the help of Tom Sheets, the Poweshiek County Sheriff, to spring the prank on their bosses. Sheriff Sheets called Dave Arendt, one of the bank’s loan officers, as he was having breakfast at the local sale barn, and he came down to the bank and remarked, “That’s good.” After the loan officer arrived, next to come in was bank president Bill Bolin, who tells what he encountered.Right away he noticed more cars than unusual outside the bank, and then he came in and saw the tape that looked like the outline of some victim — and looked up to see about half the people with cameras poised to snap his reaction. Bolin says “it was a good April Fools’ joke,” and typical of his employees.
