A heist is a theft of cash or valuable objects such as artworks, jewellery or bullion. This can take the form of either a burglary or a robbery, the difference in English and Welsh law being that a robbery uses force (which means that some of the heists commonly known as robberies were actually burglaries).^[2][3] In order to be listed here, each heist which took place in the United Kingdom is required to have taken a total sum of £1 million or more in cash or goods at contemporary rates. The largest heist was £291.9 million (equivalent to £710 million in 2021)^[4] taken in the City bonds robbery, although Charles Darwin's notebooks (announced as having been most likely stolen in 2020) were never valued. The largest cash robbery was the Securitas depot robbery.

The heists vary in location and form. Railway trains were plundered in the Great Gold Robbery and the Great Train Robbery and in 1935 there was a robbery at the Croydon Aerodrome. Exhibition spaces such as the Ashmolean Museum, the Christ Church Picture Gallery, the Harley Gallery, the National Gallery and the Whitworth Art Gallery, and stately homes such as Blenheim Palace, Drumlanrig Castle, Ramsbury Manor and Waddesdon Manor have suffered losses. Graff jewellery shops in London have been attacked several times, alongside other shops in Bond Street and Hatton Garden. Banks, secure warehouses and vaults were targeted in the cases of the Brink's-Mat robbery, the Hatton Garden safe deposit burglary, the Knightsbridge Security Deposit robbery and the Northern Bank Robbery. Regarding artworks, the Portrait of Jacob de Gheyn III by Rembrandt has been stolen a total of four times. Other paintings subject to theft include works by Cézanne, Goya and Henry Moore. The perpetrators range from individuals such as Kempton Bunton to syndicates like the Pink Panthers.

Overview

The largest UK heist on record in terms of the amount stolen was the 1990 City bonds robbery, when a courier carrying 301 bearer bonds worth £291.9 million (equivalent to £710 million in 2021)^[4] was robbed on a small City of London street. All but two of the certificates were subsequently recovered, with the heist revealing the global nature of organised crime networks and directly leading to two murders.^[5][6]

The Baker Street robbery was an audacious heist in 1971 which netted the criminals an estimated £3 million (equivalent to £45 million in 2021). They tunnelled into a vault below a Lloyds Bank branch from a shop two doors down the road. It was organised by a syndicate of five people and whilst there were three arrests, only one of the ringleaders was caught.^[7] The Hatton Garden safe deposit burglary of April 2015 shared some similarities with the Baker Street robbery.^[7] Five members of the gang were quickly arrested, yet a sixth man known only as "Basil" remained free. He was caught in 2018, when the police raided his flat and found gold and jewellery worth £143,000.^[8] The same vault had been robbed of an estimated £1.5 million by a lone thief in 2003.^[9]

It later transpired that Brian Reader was the mastermind of both the Baker Street and the 2015 Hatton Garden heists. He was 76 at the time of the latter.^[7] Reader had also been involved in processing the gold bullion stolen in the Brink's-Mat robbery of 1983, for which he served eight years in prison.^[10] Terry Perkins was another member of the gang and had previously been convicted for his part in the 1983 Security Express robbery, being sentenced to 22 years. He absconded from HM Prison Spring Hill and was on the run for 17 years before being caught again following the Hatton Garden burglary.^[11] Perkins died in HM Prison Belmarsh in 2018, aged 69.^[12] Perkins and Danny Jones (also convicted for the Hatton Garden robbery) were both linked to a previous heist at the Chatila jewellers in Old Bond Street, in 2010.^[13] The network of criminals termed the Pink Panthers has been linked to several robberies of the Graff jewellery shops in London.^[14] The Johnson Gang robbed many stately homes, including Ramsbury Manor, then the home of Harry Hyams, where they plundered goods worth approximately £30 million and Waddesdon Manor, from where they took snuffboxes worth £5 million.^[15]

Another large heist was the Knightsbridge Security Deposit robbery in 1986, which took at least £40 million (equivalent to £125 million in 2021). An Italian man later received a 22-year prison sentence for planning the venture with the help of an insider.^[16] The gang which carried out the Securitas depot robbery in 2006 first impersonated police officers in order to take the manager and his family hostage, then stole £53 million (equivalent to £82 million in 2021). They were forced to leave another £153 million behind for lack of space in the getaway vehicle. Five men were later convicted for the crime and given minimum jail sentences of between ten and fifteen years.^[16] This was the UK's largest cash robbery.^[17]

Northern Ireland's biggest heist took place in 2004. During the Northern Bank robbery in Belfast, two employees and their families were taken hostage on Sunday 19 December and the following evening a van drove away with £26.5 million in assorted bank notes. Bertie Ahern (the Irish Taoiseach) and Tony Blair (the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom) jointly accused the Provisional Irish Republican Army of planning it but nobody has ever been held directly responsible.^[18][19] Likewise, no-one responsible for the 1952 Eastcastle Street robbery was ever apprehended, although gangster Billy Hill confessed he had organised it in his memoirs.^[20]

Regarding artworks, the Portrait of Jacob de Gheyn III by Rembrandt is held by Dulwich Picture Gallery and has been stolen a total of four times.^[21][22] The small painting, which is 12 by 10 inches (30 by 25 cm), was first stolen from the museum in 1967 along with 13 other works; they were all found within a week. It was next taken in 1973 by a thief who jumped on a bicycle to make his getaway and was caught within minutes. In 1981, three men took the painting and it was later retrieved from a taxi. The last theft occurred in 1983, when thieves broke into the gallery using ladders; the painting was discovered three years later at a railway station in Münster, Germany.^[23]

The Portrait of the Duke of Wellington by Goya was stolen in 1961 from the National Gallery in London. Four years later, Kempton Bunton returned the painting and later gave himself up to the police, although it was revealed long after his death that it was actually his son who had taken the artwork.^[24] Other stolen artworks include Cézanne's View of Auvers-sur-Oise (not recovered) and Gainsborough's Portrait of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire (recovered).^[25][26] The artist cast of the sculpture Reclining Figure 1969–70 by Henry Moore was stolen in 2005 and it is most likely to have been sold as scrap metal.^[27] America was a golden toilet made as an artwork by Maurizio Cattelan.^[28] When it was stolen in 2019, it had been plumbed in to the water mains at Blenheim Palace, where it was being exhibited. Cattelan said the thieves were "great performers".^[28]

Heists