Margritte Painting Stolen

A Magritte painting has been stolen from an invitation only museum in Brussels.

The men rang the bell, asked if visiting hours had started, and then put a gun to the attendant and rounded up the visitors, and stole the work.

Seems pretty simple really.

Stockholm Helicopter Heist

Before dawn on 23 September there was a massive heist at the Stockholm cash depository. According to Ulrika Lönngren, chief of police for the southern district in Stockholm:

The helicopter landed on the roof. Then they entered the building by breaking some windows. Next, several explosions were heard from within the building, and then they were seen loading things into the helicopter and lifting off,” she told the TT news agency.

Several steps were taken to prevent police pursuit.

Caltraps - spikes spread across the road to burst car tyres - had been placed near the facility in an attempt to complicate efforts by police to approach the scene.

Also

The bandits prevented an air pursuit simply by placing a fake bomb at a poorly guarded helipad outside the capital.

Two suspects are in custody.

Airship prisonbreak plan

The Toronto Star has an article about an attempt to break out a prisoner from a prison on the Canary Islands. The plan involved using a remote controlled airship to deliver escape tools to the prisoners.

The breakout had been planned for Tuesday, a day before the detainee, whose name was given as Giulio B., was due to appear in court on charges of drug trafficking.

Three helpers had set up a camouflaged observation tent on a promontory 600 metres away from the prison, and spent months monitoring jail workers' movements with high-powered, wide-angle binoculars. They had electronic motion sensors to warn of people approaching.

Amsterdam diamond thief caught with uncut diamonds

Wired has an article about the supposed (and convicted) mastermind of the Amsterdam Diamond Robbery has been caught with 2.2 pounds of rough, uncut diamonds.

Ever the charmer, Notarbartolo claims he purchased the diamonds legitimately for a mere 10,000 euros, as he told Wired’s Joshua Davis last week through an intermediary.

Picasso's notebook stolen

The Independent reports that a notebook containing 32 sketches by Picasso has been stolen from the Picasso Museum in Paris. The notebook has been valued at 7 million Euros.

The Ministry of Culture said the cabinet holding the notebook could only be opened with a "special tool" but last night a museum employee said that the cabinet was open because the lock was broken.

Airplane repo man

Slate has an article about Nick Popovich whose company repossesses airliners and other large aircraft.

There are some adventures involved:

All commercial and private planes were grounded, but Nick Popovich wasn't one to turn down a job. So he waited for the storm to clear long enough to charter a Hawker jet from Chicago into South Carolina. There was just one detail: No one had told Popovich about the heavily armed white supremacist militia that would be guarding the aircraft when he arrived.

The Amsterdam Diamond Heist

Wired has an excellent article about the $100 million Amsterdam diamond burglary. The article is long and fairly thorough and I'm sure that there is a lot to be learned from it.

In February 2003, Notarbartolo was arrested for heading a ring of Italian thieves. They were accused of breaking into a vault two floors beneath the Antwerp Diamond Center and making off with at least $100 million worth of loose diamonds, gold, jewelry, and other spoils. The vault was thought to be impenetrable. It was protected by 10 layers of security, including infrared heat detectors, Doppler radar, a magnetic field, a seismic sensor, and a lock with 100 million possible combinations. The robbery was called the heist of the century, and even now the police can't explain exactly how it was done.

Twins foil DNA tests

Der Spiegel has an article about two German twins who have been released by police because authorities can't determine which one of them was responsible for DNA found at a crime scene.

High Tech Bank Robbers Guilty

The BBC has an article about a gang who planned to steal GBP 229 million by making fraudulent electronic transfers from the computers at Sumitomo Mitsui bank in London.

The gang installed key logging software on the bank's computers to gather userids and passwords necessary to transfer funds. But:

The "bold and sophisticated" plot was only foiled at the 11th hour by the complexities of inter-bank money transfers, the court heard.

An older BBC article has more details.

Followup: The Register also has an article which focuses on how the gang was caught.

Picasso and Matisse prints stolen

The AP reports that more than 30 works of art were stolen from a Berlin gallery over the new year holiday.

The etchings, prints and sculptures included "Profil au fond noir," a 1947 work by Picasso; "Nude in a rocking chair," a Matisse print from 1913; and "Le Boupeut," a 1962 color print by Georges Braque.

Prisoner escapes in box

The BBC has an article about a prisoner who escaped a German jail by mailing himself out in a box.

At the end of his shift, the inmate climbed into a cardboard box and was taken out of prison by express courier. His whereabouts are still unknown.

The chief warden of the jail told the BBC this was an embarrassing incident.