Britain’s Biggest Heists TV - Richard English - The Fall TV – Shankhill Butchers TV - McIntyre’s Underworld TV - Heist: The Northern Bank Robbery TV -
It was a brutal and audacious bank robbery using the maximum threat of violence and death. It sent shock waves around the world just days before Christmas in 2004 the theft of £26.5 took place from the headquarters of the Northern Bank in Belfast Northern Ireland. Britain’s Biggest Heists s1e9: The Northern Bank Robbery, 2011
Two employees and their families were abducted and held hostage by a criminal gang who threatened them with violence and death. ibid.
Following the raid the Northern Bank announced that it would take the drastic step to withdraw all its bank notes. ibid.
Too many things point it having been the IRA. One is the manner of taking people hostage ... Second is the scale of the thing. Professor Richard English, author The History of the IRA
Killer of Belfast Architect Still at Large. The Fall I starring Gillian Anderson & Jamie Dornan & Laura Donnelly & Ben Peel et al, BBC 2013, online headline
I’ve done things. Bad things. In the past. Really bad things. ibid. main man
There’s a dead female. And it looks suspicious. The Fall II, female rozzer
This is Belfast. Make time. The Fall III, head rozzer to Anderson
It’s all part of the fantasy. The fantasy that sustains him between killings. It’s about power and control and the thrill ... He’s creating his own pornography. ibid. Anderson to team
Do you have any idea of the effect you have on me? The Fall IV, him rozzer to her rozzer
The blood’s very fresh. And there’s a lot of it. The Fall V, CSI rozzer
I have something terrible to confess: I’ve been having an affair. ibid. husband to wife
He feels their pain acutely. It’s just that he gets pleasure from it. ibid. Anderson
The worst gang of serial killers in British history. A gang that gruesomely lived up to their name: the Shankill Butchers. Shankhill Butchers, BBC 2015
How did the Shankill Butchers get away with it for so long? ibid.
1972 saw the highest death toll of the Troubles in one year: nearly 500 people were killed. In January Bloody Sunday was seared into the memory. Horror followed upon horror. ibid.
Power struggles between the UDA and the UVF were rampant. ibid.
In June 1973 [Lenny] Murphy was acquitted of the Pavis murder ... He set up his own unit ... He was determined to unleash a level of sectarian savagery never before seen in Northern Ireland. ibid.
The killers were dubbed the Shankill Butchers. ibid.
Victim number five was another Catholic randomly targeted at night within a square mile of Millfield. ibid.
With nineteen murders between them they were at the time the most prolific serial killers in British history. ibid.
In November 1982 murder caught up with Lenny Murphy: he was shot in Glencairne. ibid.
Nineteen people died at the hands of the Shankill Butchers ... They used the Troubles for what they did. ibid.
All of the convicted Shankill Butchers have been released from jail. ibid.
‘The barbarism savours of Jack the Ripper butchery.’ ibid. Thomas Passmore, ex Orange Order leader
Few people in this country strike as much fear and terror as Johnny Mad Dog Adair. And yet he’s willing to risk it all just to humiliate his enemies. Over a 20-year reign Adair directed more than 40 killings and hundreds of attempted murders. Today he’s living in exile in Britain looking for a new place to call home. Macintyre’s Underworld: Mad Dog, 2010
Many believe he’s now operating as a gangsta under the directing hand of a Scottish underworld godfather. ibid.
A murderous feud between different loyalist factions. Adair’s gang were run out of town. ibid.
Jonathan [son] went on to become a drug dealer. ibid.
Dresden: here in the former East Germany a group of ex-neo-Nazis have found a new spiritual leader. ibid.
‘I fucking loved it. I loved it.’ ibid. Adair
‘I’ve just actually went through an order of, of an abduction. I actually work in the Northern Bank cash centre. They used me to rob it.’ Thirty million.’ Heist: The Northern Bank Robbery, 911 call, BBC 2021
2004: It was the biggest bank robbery in British history. Two families held hostage. A crime that shook politics in Northern Ireland to its core. ibid. caption
Who robbed them? Did the IRA carry it out? If the IRA did carry it out, did Martin McGuinness and Jerry Adams know about it. And they are at the heart of the Peace Process at this moment. ibid.
The Northern bank raid is among the biggest robberies of modern times, and yet so much of what happened is a mystery. ibid.
Internal bank CCTV captures the entire robbery unfolding. ibid.
6:28 pm: Chris returns to the bank for the real robbery to begin. ibid.
‘7 people have been arrested and more than £2 million seized: a possible connection with the Northern Bank Robbery just before Christmas … ‘A major [IRA] laundering operation.’ ibid.
Two members of the IRA are arrested in Cork. ibid.
March 2008: Three years after the robbery Ted Cunningham faced ten charges of money laundering. ibid.
January 2007: Two years after the robbery cases against two suspects collapse. ibid.
They couldn’t get any convictions: which is extraordinary when you think about this: the scale of it, the political significance of it, and the resources that the police put into this, and the huge vested interest they had in getting a conviction. ibid.