Most people want to be rich as that means you can live a carefree life without worrying about if you will be able to afford food and without needing to choose between paying rent or fixing the car. While most of us try to earn that money, a small part thinks that they can just take it from others. The most obvious place to take that money from would be a bank.
Many people have tried and failed, but there were some lucky ones who managed to escape with impressive sums of money. Twitter user Uncle Chu wrote a thread about the 10 most successful heists in history because either the money or the robbers haven't been found yet.
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Uncle Chu caught the attention of over 35k people on Twitter when he listed the 10 most successful heists in history
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Uncle Chu has shared other similar threads to this. He talked about the richest drug lords of all time, the most protected people in the world, but it seems that heists were what people were most interested in as the thread was liked by over 32k people.
The first one he mentioned was the Banco Central Burglary which is considered to be one of the biggest robberies in the world
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The first heist Uncle Chu talks about is the Banco Central Burglary, which is considered to be one of the biggest robberies in the world. In the end, 8 people were arrested and the authorities managed to recover just under $10 million that same year.
The Brink's-Mat robbery is known for not being able to recover the stolen gold
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The Brink's-Mat robbery seems not so impressive after the one in Brazil, but the value of the gold bullion, diamonds, and cash that was £26 million in 1983 would be equivalent to £89.7 million today, or $118.5 million. At that time, the heist was described as "the crime of the century." Out of the 6 robbers, 2 men were convicted, but it is not known where the majority of the gold is until this day.
The robbers of the Securitas Depot heist almost got away with stealing $105 million in today's money
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The Securitas depot robbery was also quite big as the gang stole £52,996,760 in used and unused Bank of England sterling banknotes, which is about £80 million ($105 million) in today’s currency.
To get inside the depot, they put an inside man, then abducted the manager and his family. On the night of the heist, the robbers tied up 14 workers and were threatening them with guns. 36 people were arrested and they managed to recover £18.3 million (about £27 million or $24 million by today’s rates).
The Northern Bank robbery's case is still open and nobody knows where the most of the money is
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The Northern Bank robbery took place in 2004 in Northern Ireland. The £26.5 million would be equivalent to about £43 million today ($28 million and $56 million respectively).
The case is still open and several people were arrested for the crime, however, no evidence was strong enough to convict anyone, so nobody was officially held responsible for the robbery, although £110k were recovered in 2005.
Saddam Hussein stole the biggest amount of money on this list—almost a billion dollars
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All of the previous robberies were quite insane and people stole money that would last them several lifetimes, but Saddam Hussein tops it all as he managed to get away with almost a billion dollars. The Central Bank of Iraq is like a fortress that houses a lot of the nation's treasures and its foreign currency reserves.
The day of the American invasion to Iraq in 2003, at around 4 in the morning, 3 large trucks were loaded with $900 million in U.S. $100 bills and $100 million in euros, which would be worth over a billion dollars in today’s money. There were no guns or violence, just a note from Saddam Hussein to the bank’s governor saying that he had to do this to prevent the money from being stolen by foreign hands.
It is not actually clear if the $650 million that the American sergeant found behind a false wall in one of Saddam’s palaces were actually from the heist, as an Iraqi official insisted that money belonged to Uday, the eldest son of Saddam Hussein.
The robbery of the British Bank of the Middle East is the longest on this list as it lasted for several days
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The international headquarters of the British Bank of the Middle East in Beirut were attacked in 1976, but they had difficulty getting into bank vaults, but as the country was in the middle of a civil war and the police were outgunned, the robbers had time to find a way to get to the money and gold.
They spent 2 days until locksmiths finally broke into the vaults and another 2 days loading money, gold, jewelry, rare coins and other valuables from people’s safety deposit boxes into their trucks. It is estimated that the worth of their loot was at least £25 million which would be equal to $210 million in today’s money and it is still an unsolved case despite there being many suspects.
The robber who emptied the Knightsbridge Security Deposit was arrested after very convincing evidence
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The Knightsbridge Security Deposit robbery took place in 1987 and was led by Valerio Viccei, who came from Italy to London only in 1986 and was already a suspect in 50 armed robberies there.
On the day of the robbery, two men came in pretending to want to rent a safety deposit box. The two men were armed and when they were led to the vault, they subdued the security guards and announced that the Safe Deposit Centre was closed. In the meantime they emptied the deposit box there and left with money and valuables worth of £60 million or US$98 million at that time (£179 million and $244 million in today’s money).
Viccei and some of his accomplices were arrested and the plan mastermind was sentenced to 22 years, which was not hard as investigators found a bloody fingerprint at the crime scene.
The robbers of Dar Es Salaam bank managed to take away almost $300 million and nobody know who they are or where the money is
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Another big heist in Iraq took place in 2007 when the Dar Es Salaam bank was robbed. It was weird that the bank had so many US dollars in their safe, and even though the case is not solved and the money is still missing, people guess that the robbers had some help from the local militias as there was pure chaos on the day of the heist in the streets of Baghdad.
The oldest robbery on this list is The Great Train Robbery that took place in 1963 and the thieves took about $74 million in today's money
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The Great Train Robbery is the oldest on this list, taking place in 1963. A group of 15 men, led by Bruce Reynolds, attacked a Royal Mail train. They left with £2.6 million, which doesn’t seem like a lot, but if you consider inflation, it would be £56 million today ($74 million today). Police succeeded in finding the gang’s hiding place and collecting evidence to arrest and convict most of the members of the gang.
The men who robbed the The Dunbar Armored were all caught and sentenced but only less than half of the missing money was recovered
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The Dunbar Armored robbery is considered to be the largest cash robbery in the history of the United States. It occurred in 1997 when 6 men came to the Dunbar Armored facility, now known as Loomis, which is a cash handling company.
The 6 men were childhood friends and they walked away with what would be $30.5 million today. They didn’t leave much evidence, but they were still caught as a real estate broker contacted the police when they received a stack of cash bound with the original currency straps. The buyer was one of those 6 men and he turned everyone in, even the men who helped with laundering the money, however, less than half of the money was revored.
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It’s strange how these crimes are so fascinating to us because people really like to hear about them. There are also so many successful movies including made up bank, museum and art gallery robberies with the criminals getting away, so it seems fun, but we shouldn’t forget that it’s not nice taking what doesn’t belong to you.
Do you like heist movies? Or do you like reading real heist stories? Let us know in the comments. And also, share which of these 10 stories you found the most interesting.
These are some of the reactions people had after reading the impressive but very illegal robberies
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