OKeefe claimed that he left his hotel room in Boston at approximately 7:00 p.m. on January 17, 1950. During the trip from Roxbury, Pino distributed Navy-type peacoats and chauffeurs caps to the other seven men in the rear of the truck. A t the time, the Brink's-Mat vault was thought to be one of the most secure facilities in the world. The public called the robbery the crime of the century: On January 17, 1950, armed men stole more than $2.7 million in cash, checks, money orders, and other securities from a Brink's in. The record of the state trial covered more than 5,300 pages. On August 30, he was taken into custody as a suspicious person. Because the money in the cooler was in various stages of decomposition, an accurate count proved most difficult to make. During his brief stay in Boston, he was observed to contact other members of the robbery gang. In addition, although violent dissension had developed within the gang, there still was no indication that any of the men were ready to talk. Based on the available information, however, the FBI felt that OKeefes disgust was reaching the point where it was possible he would turn against his confederates. The mass of information gathered during the early weeks of the investigation was continuously sifted. At approximately 7:30 p.m. on June 3, 1956, an officer of the Baltimore, Maryland, Police Department was approached by the operator of an amusement arcade. On August 29, 1954, the officers suspicions were aroused by an automobile that circled the general vicinity of the abandoned car on five occasions. In addition, McGinnis was named in two other complaints involving the receiving and concealing of the loot. On November, 26, 1983, three tonnes of solid gold bullion was taken by six armed robbers from the Brink's-Mat security depot near . Before removing the remainder of the loot from the house on January 18, 1950, the gang members attempted to identify incriminating items. The fiber bags used to conceal the pieces were identified as having been used as containers for beef bones shipped from South America to a gelatin manufacturing company in Massachusetts. On March 4, 1950, pieces of an identical truck were found at a dump in Stoughton, Massachusetts. Unfortunately, this proved to be an idle hope. While on bond he returned to Boston; on January 23, 1954, he appeared in the Boston Municipal Court on the probation violation charge. Others fell apart as they were handled. Baker fled and the brief meeting adjourned. A search of the hoodlums room in a Baltimore hotel (registered to him under an assumed name) resulted in the location of $3,780 that the officers took to police headquarters. Then, there was the fact that so much dead wood was includedMcGinnis, Banfield, Costa, and Pino were not in the building when the robbery took place. Other members of the robbery gang also were having their troubles. An attempted armored truck heist in South Africa was caught on camera recently; it illustrates the dangers of the job. The Brinks case was front page news. On November 26, 1981, six armed men from South London broke into the Brink's-Mat warehouse near London Heathrow. This chauffeurs cap was left at the scene of the crime of the centurythe 1950 robbery of a Brink's bank branch in Massachusetts. There were the rope and adhesive tape used to bind and gag the employees and a chauffeurs cap that one of the robbers had left at the crime scene. Stanley Gusciora (pictured left), who had been transferred to Massachusetts from Pennsylvania to stand trial, was placed under medical care due to weakness, dizziness, and vomiting. By this time, Baker was suffering from a bad case of nerves. The results were negative. As the robbers sped from the scene, a Brinks employee telephoned the Boston Police Department. Noye is currently being depicted in a new six-part BBC series into the infamous Brinks-Mat robbery, which took place in 1983. During the period immediately following the Brinks robbery, the heat was on OKeefe and Gusciora. The missing racketeers automobile was found near his home; however, his whereabouts remain a mystery. Examination by the FBI Laboratory subsequently disclosed that the decomposition, discoloration, and matting together of the bills were due, at least in part, to the fact that all of the bills had been wet. Early in June 1956, however, an unexpected break developed. He told the interviewing agents that he trusted Maffie so implicitly that he gave the money to him for safe keeping. A detective examines the Brinks vault after the theft. The most important of these, Specs OKeefe, carefully recited the details of the crime, clearly spelling out the role played by each of the eight defendants. (Geagan, who was on parole at the time, left the truck before it arrived at the home in Roxbury where the loot was unloaded. A few months prior to the robbery, OKeefe and Gusciora surreptitiously entered the premises of a protective alarm company in Boston and obtained a copy of the protective plans for the Brinks building. Within minutes, theyd stolen more than $1.2 million in cash and another $1.5 million in checks and other securities, making it the largest robbery in the U.S. at the time. On November 26 1983, six armed robbers entered the Brink's-Mat security warehouse at the Heathrow International Trading Estate. Tarr was doomed to the role of unlucky Brinks driver. On November 26, 1982, six armed robbers forced their way into the Brink's-Mat warehouse, the plan was to steal the 3.2m in cash they were expecting to find stored there. OKeefe was bitter about a number of matters. Each man also was given a pistol and a Halloween-type mask. In addition to mold, insect remains also were found on the loot. Local officers searched their homes, but no evidence linking them with the truck or the robbery was found. He claimed there was a large roll of bills in his hotel roomand that he had found that money, too. As long as he was in prison, he could do no physical harm to his Boston criminal associates. Subsequently, OKeefe left his carand the $200,000in a garage on Blue Hill Avenue in Boston. He ran a gold and jewellery dealing company, Scadlynn Ltd, in Bristol with business partners Garth Victor Chappell and Terence Edward James Patch. His case had gone to the highest court in the land. The robbers carefully planned routine inside Brinks was interrupted only when the attendant in the adjoining Brinks garage sounded the buzzer. There are still suspicions among some readers that the late Tom O'Connor, a retired cop who worked Brinks security during the robbery, was a key player, despite his acquittal on robbery charges at . The officer verified the meeting. Even if released, he thought, his days were numbered. Until the FBI and its partners painstakingly solved the case. The BBC has greenlit a documentary telling the real story of the 26M ($31.2M) Brink's-Mat robbery spotlighted in Neil Forsyth drama The Gold. Examination revealed the cause of his death to be a brain tumor and acute cerebral edema. On June 12, 1950, they were arrested at Towanda, Pennsylvania, and guns and clothing that were the loot from burglaries at Kane and Coudersport, Pennsylvania, were found in their possession. Both men remained mute following their arrests. The Brinks Mat Robbery: The real story that inspired The Gold. In the succeeding two weeks, nearly 1,200 prospective jurors were eliminated as the defense counsel used their 262 peremptory challenges. What Happened To The Brinks Mat Robbery? Two days before Maffies release, another strong suspect died of natural causes. In a series of interviews during the succeeding days, OKeefe related the full story of the Brinks robbery. Six members of the gangBaker, Costa, Geagan, Maffie, McGinnis, and Pinowere arrested by FBI agents on January 12, 1956. Thieves vanished after stealing $2.7 million, leaving few clues. The ninth man had long been a principal suspect. The FBI further learned that four revolvers had been taken by the gang. (Following pleas of guilty in November 1956, Fat John received a two-year sentence, and the other two men were sentenced to serve one years imprisonment. On the evening of January 17, 1950, employees of the security firm Brinks, Inc., in Boston, Massachusetts, were closing for the day, returning sacks of undelivered cash, checks, and other material to the company safe on the second floor. A number of them discontinued their operations; others indicated a strong desire that the robbers be identified and apprehended. In examining the bill, a Federal Reserve note, the officer observed that it was in musty condition. This occurred while he was in the state prison at Charlestown, Massachusetts, serving sentences for breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony and for having burglar tools in his possession. The amusement arcade operator told the officer that he had followed the man who passed this $10.00 bill to a nearby tavern. On November 26, 1982, six armed robbers forced their way into the Brink's-Mat warehouse, the plan was to steal the 3.2m in cash they were expecting to find stored there. Yet, it only amounted to a near perfect crime. The Great Brink's Robbery was an armed robbery of the Brink's building in the North End of Boston, Massachusetts, on January 17, 1950. The door opened, and an armed masked man wearing a prison guard-type uniform commanded the guard, Back up, or Ill blow your brains out. Burke and the armed man disappeared through the door and fled in an automobile parked nearby. There was James Ignatius Faherty, an armed robbery specialist whose name had been mentioned in underworld conversations in January 1950, concerning a score on which the gang members used binoculars to watch their intended victims count large sums of money. The series surrounds the 1983 Brink's-Mat robbery in which 26 million (equivalent to 93.3 million in 2021) worth of gold bullion, diamonds, and cash were stolen from a storehouse near Heathrow Airport. Again, he was determined to fight, using the argument that his conviction for the 1948 larceny offense was not a basis for deportation. Richardson had participated with Faherty in an armed robbery in February 1934. The. He was paroled in the fall of 1944 and remained on parole through March 1954 when misfortune befell him. As a cooperative measure, the information gathered by the FBI in the Brinks investigation was made available to the District Attorney of Suffolk County, Massachusetts. OKeefe and Gusciora had been close friends for many years. Despite the lack of evidence and witnesses upon which court proceedings could be based, as the investigation progressed there was little doubt that OKeefe had been one of the central figures in the Brinks robbery. That same afternoon (following the admission that Fat John had produced the money and had described it as proceeds from the Brinks robbery), a search warrant was executed in Boston covering the Tremont Street offices occupied by the three men. Of the hundreds of New England hoodlums contacted by FBI agents in the weeks immediately following the robbery, few were willing to be interviewed. This man subsequently identified locks from doors which the Brinks gang had entered as being similar to the locks which Pino had brought him. Due to his criminal record, the Immigration and Naturalization Service instituted proceedings in 1941 to deport him. The new proceedings were based upon the fact that Pino had been arrested in December 1948 for a larceny involving less than $100. A systematic check of current and past Brinks employees was undertaken; personnel of the three-story building housing the Brinks offices were questioned; inquiries were made concerning salesmen, messengers, and others who had called at Brinks and might know its physical layout as well as its operational procedures. At approximately 7:00 p.m. on January 17, 1950, members of the gang met in the Roxbury section of Boston and entered the rear of the Ford stake-body truck. OKeefe had left his hotel at approximately 7:00 p.m. Pino and Baker separately decided to go out at 7:00 p.m. Costa started back to the motor terminal at about 7:00 p.m. Other principal suspects were not able to provide very convincing accounts of their activities that evening. While Maffie claimed that part of the money had been stolen from its hiding place and that the remainder had been spent in financing OKeefes legal defense in Pennsylvania, other gang members accused Maffie of blowing the money OKeefe had entrusted to his care. On June 5 and June 7, the Suffolk County grand jury returned indictments against the three mencharging them with several state offenses involving their possessing money obtained in the Brinks robbery. The Brink's-Mat robbery occurred at the Heathrow International Trading Estate, London, United Kingdom, on 26 November 1983 and was one of the largest robberies in British history. They put the entire $200,000 in the trunk of OKeefes automobile. All but Pino and Banfield stepped out and proceeded into the playground to await Costas signal. Each of them had surreptitiously entered the premises on several occasions after the employees had left for the day. In the back were Pino, OKeefe, Baker, Faherty, Maffie, Gusciora, Michael Vincent Geagan (pictured), and Thomas Francis Richardson. On June 4, 1956 a man named "Fat John" admitted he had money that was linked to the Brink's robbery in his possession. It was almost the perfect crime. From their prison cells, they carefully followed the legal maneuvers aimed at gaining them freedom. The Brinks Mat Robbery: The real story that inspired The Gold. The other gang members would not talk. Since the robbery had taken place between approximately 7:10 and 7:27 p.m., it was quite probable that a gang, as well drilled as the Brinks robbers obviously were, would have arranged to rendezvous at a specific time. At the time of their arrest, Faherty and Richardson were rushing for three loaded revolvers that they had left on a chair in the bathroom of the apartment. He was granted a full pardon by the acting governor of Massachusetts. The Bureau was convinced that it had identified the actual robbers, but evidence and witnesses had to be found. With the death of Gusciora, only eight members of the Brinks gang remained to be tried. Again, the FBIs investigation resulted merely in the elimination of more possible suspects. Pino had been questioned as to his whereabouts on the evening of January 17, 1950, and he provided a good alibi. Shakur, the stepfather of hip-hop star . On February 5, 1950, however, a police officer in Somerville, Massachusetts, recovered one of the four revolvers that had been taken by the robbers. McAvoy had attempted to reach a settlement with prosecutors in the case when he offered to repay his share, but by that time the money was gone. Adding to these problems was the constant pressure being exerted upon Pino by OKeefe from the county jail in Towanda, Pennsylvania. On November 26, 1981, six armed men from South London broke into the Brink's-Mat warehouse near London Heathrow. Using the outside door key they had previously obtained, the men quickly entered and donned their masks. He had been convicted of armed robbery in 1940 and served several months in the Massachusetts State Reformatory and the Norfolk, Massachusetts, Prison Colony. Inside this container were packages of bills that had been wrapped in plastic and newspapers. After each interview, FBI agents worked feverishly into the night checking all parts of his story which were subject to verification. (Investigation to substantiate this information resulted in the location of the proprietor of a key shop who recalled making keys for Pino on at least four or five evenings in the fall of 1949. Two days after Christmas of 1955, FBI agents paid another visit to OKeefe. At that time, Pino approached OKeefe and asked if he wanted to be in on the score. His close associate, Stanley Gusciora, had previously been recruited, and OKeefe agreed to take part. Three years later, Great Train Robber. Those killed in the. The. Shortly before 7:30 p.m., they were surprised by five menheavily disguised, quiet as mice, wearing gloves to avoid leaving fingerprints and soft shoes to muffle noise. An automobile identified as the car used in the escape was located near a Boston hospital, and police officers concealed themselves in the area. . The eight men were sentenced by Judge Forte on October 9, 1956. The FBIs analysis of the alibis offered by the suspects showed that the hour of 7:00 p.m. on January 17, 1950, was frequently mentioned. July 18, 2022, 9:32 AM UTC. The criminal explained that he was in the contracting business in Boston and that in late March or early April 1956, he stumbled upon a plastic bag containing this money while he was working on the foundation of a house. Instead, they found three tonnes of gold bullion. On June 19, 1958, while out on appeal in connection with a five-year narcotics sentence, he was found shot to death in an automobile that had crashed into a truck in Boston.). Almost. Despite the arrests and indictments in January 1956, more than $2,775,000, including $1,218,211.29 in cash, was still missing. At 10:25 p.m. on October 5, 1956, the jury retired to weigh the evidence. Thus, when he and Gusciora were taken into custody by state authorities during the latter part of January 1950, OKeefe got word to McGinnis to recover his car and the $200,000 that it contained. During these weeks, OKeefe renewed his association with a Boston racketeer who had actively solicited funds for the defense of OKeefe and Gusciora in 1950. After these plans were reviewed and found to be unhelpful, OKeefe and Gusciora returned them in the same manner. Subsequently, he engaged in a conversation with McGinnis and a Boston police officer. In addition, McGinnis received other sentences of two years, two and one-half to three years, and eight to ten years. When OKeefe admitted his part in the Brinks robbery to FBI agents in January 1956, he told of his high regard for Gusciora. Masterminded by Brian 'The Colonel' Robinson and Mickey McAvoy, the gang hoped to make off with 3 million in cash, a sum that's now equivalent to just over 9 million. Somehow the criminals had opened at least threeand possibly fourlocked doors to gain entrance to the second floor of Brinks, where the five employees were engaged in their nightly chore of checking and storing the money collected from Brinks customers that day. On the 26 November 1983, half a dozen armed men broke into the Brink's-Mat depot near London's Heathrow Airport, where they were expecting to find a million pounds worth of foreign currency.. A few weeks later, OKeefe retrieved his share of the loot. More than 100 persons took the stand as witnesses for the prosecution and the defense during September 1956. Approximately one and one-half hours later, Banfield returned with McGinnis. Gusciora also claimed to have been drinking that evening. However, by delving into the criminal world, Edwyn. The trip from the liquor store in Roxbury to the Brinks offices could be made in about 15 minutes. BOSTON Friday, Jan. 17, 2020 marks 70 years since a group of armed and masked men stole millions of dollars from an armored car depot in the North End in what the FBI still calls "the crime of the century.". After the truck parts were found, additional suspicion was attached to these men. At the Prison Colony, Baker was serving two concurrent terms of four to ten years, imposed in 1944 for breaking and entering and larceny and for possession of burglar tools. At the time of Bakers release in 1949, Pino was on hand to drive him back to Boston. All efforts to identify the gang members through the chauffeurs hat, the rope, and the adhesive tape which had been left in Brinks proved unsuccessful. Evidently resigned to long years in prison or a short life on the outside, OKeefe grew increasingly bitter toward his old associates. In 1936 and 1937, Faherty was convicted of armed robbery violations. On the night of January 17, 1952exactly two years after the crime occurredthe FBIs Boston Office received an anonymous telephone call from an individual who claimed he was sending a letter identifying the Brinks robbers. Pino could have been at McGinnis liquor store shortly after 7:30 p.m. on January 17, 1950, and still have participated in the robbery. OKeefe did not know where the gang members had hidden their shares of the lootor where they had disposed of the money if, in fact, they had disposed of their shares. From the size of the loot and the number of men involved, it was logical that the gang might have used a truck. Information received from this individual linked nine well-known hoodlums with the crime. Terry Perkins. The group were led . At the time of his arrest, there also was a charge of armed robbery outstanding against him in Massachusetts. After being wounded on June 16, OKeefe disappeared. And the gang felt that the chances of his talking were negligible because he would be implicated in the Brinks robbery along with the others. McGinnis had been arrested at the site of a still in New Hampshire in February 1954. Their plan was to enter the Brinks building and take a truck containing payrolls. The serial numbers of several of these bills were furnished to the FBI Office in Baltimore. The full details of this important development were immediately furnished to the FBI Office in Boston. He was certain he would be considered a strong suspect and wanted to begin establishing an alibi immediately.) He later was to be arrested as a member of the robbery gang. At 6:30am, six armed robbers from a south London gang entered the premises of the Brink's-Mat warehouse at Heathrow. Following the robbery, authorities attempted unsuccessfully to locate him at the hotel. Born in Italy in 1907, Pino was a young child when he entered the United States, but he never became a naturalized citizen. Some of the bills were in pieces. Prominent among the other strong suspects was Vincent James Costa, brother-in-law of Pino. On January 10, 1953, following his appearance before the federal grand jury in connection with the Brinks case, Pino was taken into custody again as a deportable alien. Their success in evading arrest ended abruptly on May 16, 1956, when FBI agents raided the apartment in which they were hiding in Dorchester, Massachusetts. A third attempt on OKeefes life was made on June 16, 1954. In the end, the perfect crime had a perfect endingfor everyone but the robbers. Another old gang that had specialized in hijacking bootlegged whiskey in the Boston area during Prohibition became the subject of inquiries. Both of these strong-arm suspects had been questioned by Boston authorities following the robbery. Had any particles of evidence been found in the loot which might directly show that they had handled it? Henry Baker, another veteran criminal who was rumored to be kicking in to the Pennsylvania defense fund, had spent a number of years of his adult life in prison. A second shooting incident occurred on the morning of June 14, 1954, in Dorchester, Massachusetts, when OKeefe and his racketeer friend paid a visit to Baker. Like the others, Banfield had been questioned concerning his activities on the night of January 17, 1950. After completing its hearings on January 9, 1953, the grand jury retired to weigh the evidence. Considerable thought was given to every detail.
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