True Crime Heist

Am 7. August 1963 überfiel eine sechzehnköpfige Bande einen schlecht gesicherten Postzug der Royal Mail und erbeutete über 2,6 Millionen Pfund, was zu einem aufsehenerregenden Prozess, spektakulären Gefängnisausbrüchen und einer langanhaltenden medialen Faszination führte. Einer der Täter, Ronald Biggs, floh nach dem Überfall ins Ausland, lebte lange Zeit in Brasilien und wurde später durch seine Flucht und sein Leben im Exil zu einer Kultfigur dieses Falles.

Viele berüchtigte Outlaws des Wilden Westens, darunter Sam Bass und Rube Burrow, begannen ihre kriminelle Laufbahn mit Postkutschen- und später Zugüberfällen, nachdem sie an bürgerlichen Existenzen oder persönlichen Schicksalsschlägen gescheitert waren. Ihre Geschichten zeigen eine Eskalation von improvisierten Raubzügen zu gut geplanten Überfällen, die jedoch meist tragisch endeten – sei es durch Verrat, Festnahme oder tödliche Schusswechsel.

Ever been fascinated by the complex world of serial killers? It's so complex but also simple if you really think about it. Right? Want to get a deeper insight like, "What makes someone turn to cannibalism?" or "How do experts dissect a crime scene?" Well, "Serial Killer Trivia" will satisfy all those burning curiosities. And the ones you didn't know existed!

Growing up, Michael wanted nothing more than to follow in his dad’s footsteps and join the family business. Aged 18, he did just that and entered into the glamourous, dangerous world of organised crime. Michael’s father, a career criminal and contemporary of the infamous Krays, was a wayward role model. Soon, Michael’s criminal activities were funding a reckless lifestyle of drugs, sex, and violence.

For centuries, works of art have been stolen in countless ways from all over the world, but no one has been quite as successful at it as the master thief Stéphane Breitwieser. Carrying out more than 200 heists over nearly ten years - in museums and cathedrals all over Europe - Breitwieser, along with his girlfriend who worked as his lookout, stole more than 300 objects, until it all fell apart in spectacular fashion. In The Art Thief, Michael Finkel brings us into Breitwieser’s strange and fascinating world.

In 2001, thieves parked a box truck in front of an aging tycoon’s factory, cut the phone lines, and used an overhead crane to lift out their prize: a 1938 Talbot-Lago T150-C SS Teardrop coupe—“the most beautiful car in the world” and one of only two in existence—then they disappeared into the night. The tycoon died. The trail went cold. End of story. Until it wasn’t.

What is it that fascinates so many people about Ronnie Biggs and makes him a household name sixty years on from the crime that made his name? Is it the man or the myth that makes Ron a latter-day Robin Hood, and the odd man out who is best remembered from a gang of sixteen who held up a mail train in August 1963? This book covers Ron's entire life including the Great Train Robbery, his conviction and subsequent escape from HMP Wandsworth. Ron tells how he managed to outrun and outthink the posse of law enforcement officers and the media that chased him around the world.

On Saturday, 26 November 1983, an armed gang stole gold bullion worth almost £26 million from the Brink's-Mat security depot near London's Heathrow Airport. It was the largest robbery in world history, and only the start of an extraordinary story. For forty years, myths and legends have grown around the Brink's-Mat heist and the events that followed.

Музеи — тюрьма для искусства. Когда прямо перед тобой шедевр, при виде которого перехватывает дыхание, а на глаза наворачиваются слезы, что может быть естественнее желания любоваться им бесконечно долго, проследить пальцами точные движения резца или кисти?.. Все это, конечно, удобнее делать в тишине и уединении, устроившись в любимом кресле.

A skilled con artist and perhaps one of the most charming, audacious burglars in history, Arthur Barry slipped in and out of the bedrooms of New York’s wealthiest residents, even as his victims slept only inches away. He befriended luminaries such as the Prince of Wales and Harry Houdini and became a folk hero, touted in the press as “the greatest jewel thief who ever lived” and an “aristocrat of crime.”

On the 8th August 1963 a gang of 15 men stopped a mail train in Buckinghamshire and proceeded to steal sacks of money worth £2.6 million. It was the biggest heist ever carried out in the UK and frontpage news around the world. The mastermind behind this most audacious crime of the twentieth century was Bruce Reynolds. Perhaps the last of the 'gentlemen villains'; Reynolds epitomised that particular breed of sharply dressed post-war criminals who mixed with royalty and movie stars, and never carried a gun. They thrived on adventure and glamour, and the Great Train Robbery was their last ride.

Bei einem Überfall auf einen Postzug wurden im April 1990 von einer Bande mit professionellem Know-how über 35 Millionen Schilling erbeutet, wobei der Postkursleiter dabei getötet wurde. Es war nicht der einzige Überfall auf Geldtransporte in Österreich dieser gut vorbereiteten Täter, die bis heute unvergessen bleiben.

In what has been described as a true-life blend of Grumpy Old Men and Ocean's Eleven, Sexy Beasts is an insider account of the 2015 Hatton Garden Heist, in which a group of retirement-age career criminals - the so-called "Diamond Geezers" - robbed a London jewelry vault, in what would be the biggest burglary in UK history. The Hatton Garden Heist captured the British public's imagination more than another other crime since The Great Train Robbery. It was supposed to make a fortune for a team of old time professional criminals. Their last hurrah.

In this breathtaking adventure, featuring colorful characters from showbusiness alongside royalty, the IRA and even Pablo Escobar, Clifford Thurlow reveals Keith Cheeseman's incredible true story for the first time.

Richard Vaux has done his share of dirty work, but nothing like this. His employer, Trans World Airlines, wants him and a crew to sneak into Beirut, Lebanon, at the height of a civil war, to reclaim an airplane hijacked by Palestinian terrorists. TWA can't say for sure whether the plane will fly or whether it has been wired to explode in flight. And that's assuming they aren't attacked by one or more of the rival militias who pass the time shooting at each other across the tarmac, but only because there haven't been any Americans to kidnap in a while.

On 24 May 1971, based on a telephone call purportedly from Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and her secretary P.N. Haksar, the chief cashier at the Parliament Street branch of the State Bank of India handed over Rs 60 lakh to a stranger posing as the PM's courier. The money was supposedly meant for secret operations in East Pakistan. When the chief cashier approached the PMO for a receipt, he was told that neither Haksar nor the PM had given any such instructions. He had been duped.

This is the story of how Securicor guard Eddie Maher managed to pull off a £1.2 million heist, fled the country despite every port being closed, spawned an international manhunt and managed to evade capture for 20 years. As Britain's most wanted man, he led 30 detectives, FBI and Interpol on a wild goose chase across the USA. Dubbed 'Fast Eddie' by the press, he was always one step ahead.

From murder and robberies to arson and blackmail, the 20 stories in this book are some of the most fascinating true crime stories ever recorded. Each of these cases is so bizarre that they confounded the police, baffled investigators and captured the attention of the press all over the world. These short and accessible stories include encyclopaedic information on when and how the crimes were committed, the background of each criminal, and their trials and punishments - for those that were caught.

On June 15, 1862, a gang of bushrangers held up a gold escort at Eugowra, just east of Forbes, NSW. They escaped with a pile of cash and 77 kilograms of gold, worth about $10 million today. It remains the largest gold robbery in Australian history. In this riveting recreation of the events, James Phelps finally tells the full story of how Frank Gardiner, Ben Hall, John O'Meally, Johnny Gilbert, Henry Manns, Alexander Fordyce, John Bow and Dan Charters planned and executed the robbery - and what happened to all that gold.

In 1907, the revolutionary Joseph Djugashvili - who would later take the name Joseph Stalin - met with an old friend, a clerk at the Tiflis branch of the State Bank of the Russian Empire, for a glass of milk. Over talk of national pride, the spirit of the new century and Djugashvili's poetry, they agreed on the beginnings of a plan. With the aid of the Outfit, Djugashvili's hardened crew of 'expropriators', they would pull off the biggest, bloodiest and most daring robbery in Georgia's history, and ruthlessly change the direction of the Bolshevik revolution forever.