Hill himself was setting up the most audacious robberies of all: in 1952 a team of his stole more than £200,000 from a post office van. Gangster Kings of the Underworld: Jack Spot
Tommy [Adams] hit the big time. He was the key player in Britain’s biggest heist when raiders escaped with £26,000,000 of gold ingots ... Tommy Adams was acquitted. Godfathers: The Adams North London
By the early 1960s, after the birth of his second son Jamie, Freddie [Foreman] had set up one of the most successful robbery firms in the country, with Mickey Regan and Alfie Gerrard. Freddie invested in houses, nightclubs, casinos, betting shops and minicab offices. Fred: The Godfather of British Crime, captions, 2018
Ruthless in its conception, fearless in its operation, the Brink’s-Mat heist is still the largest bullion robbery in British criminal history. In just fifteen minutes a highly organised south-London gang of armed robbers made off with three tons of gold from the Fort-Knox style warehouse near Heathrow. Britain’s Biggest Heists s1e1: The Brink’s-Mat Robbery, Sky 2010
Brink’s-Mat was no ordinary warehouse. It was one of the most secure buildings in Britain, containing three of the world’s toughest safes. To get to them once inside the warehouse it was necessary to pass through locked and alarmed vault doors, using two sets of keys and combinations numbers, then through a gate. One inside the vault the safes could only be opened by a set of keys and combination numbers. ibid.
Whilst Robinson, McAvoy and White were arrested and questioned by the police, the pressure was on detectives to find the missing gold. Seven months after the robbery the police got another breakthrough when a man called Kenneth James Noye was brought to their attention. They were back on the gold trail. ibid.
Ironically, the gold was being sold back to the company it had been stolen from. ibid.
The 4th April 1983 went down in criminal history: a gang of armed robbers raided a high security depot in London nicknamed Fort Knox. The heist was executed with military precision. The robbers carefully planned their attack and fled without a trace. They held the guards to ransom for an agonising eight hours then stole almost £7 million. Britain’s Biggest Heists s1e2: Security Express Heist
But how the gang managed to infiltrate a top-security depot remained a mystery until some time later. ibid.
This was a robbery that shook London. It took the authorities over seven years to recover less than half the cash. The whereabouts of the rest of the money remains a mystery. But despite the gang’s planning and skill, most were brought to justice. ibid.
In 1987 affluent Knightsbridge, London, is the scene of an armed raid so spectacular it’s set to enter the criminal records books as one of the heists of the century. A staggering £40,000,000 of valuables is stolen when a ruthless Italian robber smashes his way into hundreds of safety deposit boxes. Britain’s Biggest Heists s1e3: Knightsbridge, 2010
As [Parvez] Latif shows the men the facilities the mood quickly changes when one of them pulls a gun. With a gun to his back the owner is quickly led to the security room ... The security deposit boxes are housed in a solid steel vault in the basement of the building. Four thousand containers line the room but only eight hundred are in use, holding anything from deeds and bombs to cash and jewellery. ibid.
Officers may have a fingerprint but matching it to a suspect is a different matter ... Valerio Viccei is a criminal like no other: flash, brash and with good looks t’boot. He’d got Italian charm, charisma and a playboy lifestyle. ibid.
Detectives discovered he [Viccei] was responsible for at least five armed robberies in London netting him over a quarter of a million pounds to fund work on Knightsbridge amongst other things. ibid.
But this wasn’t a plot from a movie. This is the incredible story of the Millennium Dome Diamond Heist. Britain’s Biggest Heists s1e4: Millennium Dome Diamond Heist, 2010
A second attempted robbery five months later in Kent was almost a carbon copy of Nine Elms. ibid.
[Lee] Wenham had his eye on the Millennium Star – one of the most expensive diamonds in the world exhibited at the Dome with other precious stones. This diamond was so rare because it had no flaws. No imperfections whatsoever. ibid.
As the police prepared for the showdown so did the gang ... For months they have been secretly following a gang of London crooks. ibid.
The operation was a complete success. The entire gang were apprehended without any casualties. Cockram and Adams had been the ones trying to smash the cabinets. Ciarrochi had been tasked with the smoke bombs. Betson was nabbed at the wheel of the JCB, leaving Meredith outside on the boat, and Millman across the river – both oblivious officers were coming to get them. ibid.
‘It [JCB] crashes through suddenly these big Perspex doors in the Dome and moves right around outside the jewel house ... They were through, and it just needs a hand to reach in and take the diamond. And we saw these smoke bombs being thrown which are causing absolute pandemonium ... We controlled the area and moved in and they were arrested.’ ibid.
In September 1971 Lloyds Bank in Baker Street London became the scene of one of the most death-defying robberies of all time. Britain’s Biggest Heists s2e1: The Baker Street Robbery, 2011
In the dead of night Robert Rowlands feared he may have stumbled upon a robbery in progress. Concerned that he had somehow managed to tune in to a frequency being used by thieves, Rowlands knew he had to inform the authorities. ibid.
They didn’t know it was ... Scotland Yard were listening in. ibid.
The daring gang had somehow managed to dig their way through mounds of earth and rubble to the floor of the vault. ibid.
Allegations that the target was not in fact money and jewels but in fact compromising photographs of people in power were quickly dismissed by the Yard. ibid.
Police had their first major lead which led them to sixty-four-year-old leather goods dealer Benjamin Wolfe. ibid.
No forensic clues were left. ibid.
A careless oversight on the lease of the shop. ibid.
None of the stolen goods were recovered from the raid. ibid.
In April 1975 a gang of top criminals entered the Bank of America in London’s exclusive Mayfair dressed as smart businessmen. They raided the bank’s safe deposit boxes and stole an astonishing eight million of cash, jewels and high value items. Britain’s Biggest Heists s2e2: The Bank of America Robbery
Twenty-six-year-old Stuart Buckley was serving a nine-month prison sentence for stolen goods. ibid.
Responding to a job vacancy Buckley had secured an electrician’s post at the Bank of America. ibid.
In the 1970s they had nine branches. ibid.
The whole bank’s security procedure was questionable. ibid.
Whilst he already had keys to the bank’s side door he did not have keys to the vault area itself where all the money and valuable items were kept. ibid.
The police didn’t think the crime was that serious. ibid. first attempt
Brazenly, they set about planning a second attempt. ibid.
Hostages: they were left bound and gagged as the robbers escaped with their haul. ibid.
News of the heist was soon making the headlines. ibid.
The Flying Squad were quickly drafted in to investigate the crime. ibid.
The police quickly identified Stuart Buckley’s role in the heist. ibid.
Stuart Buckley was awarded super-grass status. ibid.
The 1970s gave birth to the era of the super-grass and opened a new chapter of criminal investigation in Britain. ibid.
In the summer of 1995 a gang of masked men viciously attacked a security van in Salford Greater Manchester. Over £6,000,000 was stolen when the van was dramatically ambushed at a security depot. Britain’s Biggest Heists s2e4: The Midland Bank Robbery, 2011
This major breach of protocol [not pushing panic button] threw Graham Huckerby [van driver] straight into the frame. ibid.
In May 2004 a gang of eight masked robbers raided a high security bonded warehouse near Heathrow Airport. They were planning to steal millions of pounds’ worth of gold bullion and cash. But instead of a jackpot they found the Flying Squad. Britain’s Biggest Heists s2e5: Swissport Robbery, 2011
The police arrested a baggage handler thief who came forward as a supergrass. ibid.
During a two-year reign of terror across the UK a gang of ruthless robbers targeted security depots and cash-in-transit vans. Their method was elaborate and unique creating devastation in their wake. But each time they struck they left vital clues. Britain’s Biggest Heists s2e6: The Battering Ram Gang
In less than two minutes the gang had ransacked the place and fled with a major amount of cash. ibid.
Terrorising other parts of the UK: Liverpool, Bolton, Radcliffe, Salford & Dartford. ibid.