True Heist

When he retired as the chief security officer of New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art, John Barelli had spent the better part of 40 years responsible not only for one of the richest treasure troves on the planet, but the museum's staff, the millions of visitors, as well as American presidents, royalty, and heads of state from around the world. For the first time, John Barelli shares his experiences of the crimes that occurred on his watch, the investigations that captured thieves and recovered artwork....

On 22 February 2006, GBP53 million was stolen from a cash warehouse belonging to the Securitas company in Tonbridge, Kent. In terms of value, the robbery puts previous British capers, such as the Great Train Robbery, in the shade. This was a crime notable for its audacity, carried out by an unlikely crew of players that included a used car salesman, two Albanian casual workers and a roofer. Five men were convicted at the Old Bailey in January 2008, which attracted nationwide media coverage.

As a string of high-profile jewel thefts went unsolved during the Swinging Sixties, the press dubbed the elusive thief the King of Diamonds. Like Cary Grant in To Catch a Thief, the King was so bold that he tip-toed into the homes of millionaires while they were home, hiding in their closets and daring to smoke while they were sleeping. Rena Pederson, then a young reporter with UPI, started following the elusive thief while she managed the night desk. With gymnastic skill, he climbed trees and crawled across rooftops to take jewels from heiresses, oil kings, corporate CEOs.

What If I Told You That $100 Million in Diamonds Vanished From One of the World's Most Secure Airports in Broad Daylight? You'd probably think it was fiction. You'd be wrong. On a cold February afternoon in 2005, Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport became the scene of one of the most audacious heists in criminal history. In less than sixty seconds, armed men disguised as KLM employees terrorized four airport workers and vanished with a fortune in diamonds destined for Antwerp—the world's diamond capital.

It’s no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions and health coverage earned by millions of retirees. Employers blame an aging workforce, stock market losses, and spiraling costs - a perfect storm of external forces that has forced them to take drastic measures. But this so-called retirement crisis is no accident. Award-winning investigative reporter Ellen E. Schultz reveals how large companies and the retirement industry - benefits consultants, insurance companies, and banks - have all played a huge, hidden role in the death spiral of American pensions and benefits.

Unlock the cultural obsession with high-stakes robberies in Heist, a collection of the world's greatest real-life break-ins. From the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's famous art heist to the disappearance of the Marie Antoinette watch, these 100% true stories will have you on the edge of your...

At just 21 years of age, friends Todd Wilson and Scott McCarthy were virtually inseparable. The pair reported for duty at United Bank of Denver at 6: 00 a.m. on Father’s Day 1991—McCarthy’s first day on the job. They joined two more experienced guards and began making their rounds. By 9:30 a.m., all four were dead. The killer then descended upon the cash vault where he held six petrified tellers at gunpoint before absconding with nearly $200,000. Eighteen days later, the Denver Police Department arrested one of its own. Not only had retired sergeant James W.

AN NPR NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR From the award-winning and bestselling author of Feed comes a raucous, slyly funny, and delightfully queer work of historical fantasy, based on a bizarre but true quest to steal the mystical corpse of a long-dead saint "[An] uproarious saga . . . drawing on...

An award-wining and "outrageously entertaining" true crime story (San Francisco Chronicle) about the professional hockey player-turned-bank robber whose bizarre and audacious crime spree galvanized Hungary in the decade after the fall of the Iron Curtain. During the 1990s, while playing for the...

Killing Goldfinger charts the extraordinary rise and spectacular bullet-riddled fall of John Palmer, the richest, most powerful criminal ever to have emerged from the modern British underworld. Palmer earned his nickname Goldfinger after smelting (in his back garden) tens of millions of pounds worth of stolen gold bullion from the 20th century's most lucrative heist; the Brink's-Mat robbery. Palmer then used his share of the millions to become the vicious overlord of a vast illegal timeshare property empire in Tenerife.

They broke into a bank by crawling through sewage—and emerged as legends. In 1976, under the glamorous streets of Nice, France, a group of thieves pulled off a bank robbery that defied logic and stunned the world. Led by the enigmatic Albert Spaggiari, the gang spent months tunneling through sewers and solid rock to breach the Société Générale vault during a long holiday weekend. Once inside, they worked for nearly three days—stealing millions in cash, gold, and jewels from over 400 deposit boxes. They left without a trace, except a note: “Without weapons, nor hate, nor violence.”

The vault was deemed impenetrable—until it wasn’t. On a quiet weekend in February 2003, a crew of highly skilled thieves pulled off the largest diamond heist in history. Located in Antwerp, Belgium—the epicenter of the world’s diamond trade—the target was a vault protected by motion detectors, seismic sensors, infrared heat detectors, and over a dozen layers of physical security. Still, the thieves broke in, stole more than $100 million in diamonds, gold, and jewels, and walked away clean—at least for a while. In The Antwerp Diamond Heist: The Perfect Crime (2003), true crime author James G.

On February 12, 1994, just as the Winter Olympics opened in Lillehammer, Norway’s most famous artwork—Edvard Munch’s The Scream—was stolen in under 60 seconds from the National Gallery in Oslo. The culprits? A group of masked men with alleged ties to a modern-day Templar revivalist movement, combining ideology, symbolism, and street-level criminal precision.

The extraordinary story of the theft of priceless Chinese antiques around the world and the connection to crimes spanning more than two centuries—with present-day implications.

Understand the background behind a historic theft of ether. Dive into the Ethereum blockchain that hosts smart contracts. Learn more about the team that established Ethereum and kept it alive. Keep pace with what’s happening in blockchain and what the financial future may hold. The potential of blockchain to transform industries, from finance to health care, has garnered the attention of corporations and individuals all over the world. A heist of millions demands evaluation.

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist: Art, Ambition, and Unsolved Mystery (1990) offers a gripping deep dive into the events of that night and the decades-long investigation that followed. Author James G. Edwards II masterfully blends true crime with art history, exploring how a single robbery devastated a cultural institution, shook the art world, and fueled countless theories—from mob connections to inside jobs.

Today, art theft is one of the most profitable criminal enterprises in the world, exceeding $6 billion in losses to galleries and art collectors annually. And the masterpieces of Rembrandt van Rijn are some of the most frequently targeted. In Stealing Rembrandts, art security expert Anthony M. Amore and award-winning investigative reporter Tom Mashberg reveal the actors behind the major Rembrandt heists in the last century. Through thefts around the world—from Stockholm to Boston, Worcester to Ohio—the authors track daring entries and escapes from the world's most renowned museums.

In February 2003, thieves pulled off the impossible—breaching Antwerp’s “impenetrable” vault and vanishing with over $100 million in diamonds, gold, and cash. No alarms, no broken locks, no trace. Dubbed the heist of the century, this true-crime account reveals how a crew of Italian specialists infiltrated the world’s diamond capital, outsmarted state-of-the-art security, and disappeared into legend. Riveting and meticulously researched, The Antwerp Diamond Heist uncovers the planning, execution, and enduring mystery of history’s greatest gem theft.

The Street Agent chronicles cases in which Manis served as the case agent, immersing listeners in the high-stakes chases, shootouts, and undercover operations he led. Events are recounted through his eyes as they unfolded with terrorists, Klansmen, mobsters, and murderers. Now free to tell his story, Manis offers an unfiltered view of an FBI that demands absolute courage and unyielding dedication at street level.

On December 11, 1978, masked men stormed JFK Airport’s Lufthansa terminal and escaped with nearly six million dollars in cash and jewels—the largest cash robbery in American history. What began as the perfect crime soon unraveled into paranoia, betrayal, and murder. The Lufthansa Heist: The Mafia’s Greatest Airport Robbery pulls you inside the planning, execution, and bloody aftermath of a job that made history, destroyed lives, and remains unsolved in the eyes of the law.