Ocean's Ten: The Baker Street Robbery

kind of ambulance. This was an emergency circumcision ambulance. Yes, I need more information, girl, do you This emergency circumcision ambulance was also an Audi T T. And if you don't know sports cars, imagine a smooth backed German sports car. That is it the aud E T T. Now what's going on with the emergency circumcision that you need a sports car to get this kind of emergency? So many

emergency circumcisions are there. We gotta get this baby cut stat I got a middle aged man and needs a circumcision. It's a reversal. I don't understand this. Yeah. Well, Also, while we're at it, I found a photo. So this is what it looks like. The EGENC. It was like when I open ah. No, the emergency circumcision ambulance is a green and yellow out e T T that is loud, loud, and you're not gonna miss it. No, not at all. I still, so, did you ever find out did you

look into what this emergency circumcision thing is about? I could not find much. I was looking like on Vice UK in different places, and it's mostly people just covered the theft right and then finding the actual answer. It's just as medical response on it. So I couldn't find a company. I couldn't. So we need to go to London call and be like, hurry, we need a circumcision,

hurry stats and then when they show up we interview them. Okay, I like this, don't The Italian police have like a Ferrari they use or something like that for I believe, I believe. And then the in Dubai they have almost an entire fleet of sports cars for the police because they had so many wealthy jerks who go out there and drive super fast in the desert that they needed their own supercars to catch them. So they have like mcclarens and Ferraris and Lamborghinis and like just a ton

of like super supercars and the whole. The Italian one is to take organ donations. Oh yeah, that's actual. That's like the medical one the Ambulans talking about. I was going with the police. Yeah, well they're all the the I don't know authorities whatever they are. So yes, ridiculous emergency circumcision. Yes, so there you go, totally ridiculous. Um, I'll tell you what else is ridiculous. A bank heist that is a premonition, a preview of a later ridiculous

bank heist. Wit, a premonition of a bank HAIs like a psychic kind of pition. Shall be foretold. This is Ridiculous Crime. A podcast about absurd and outrageous capers. He cons It's always murder free and one ridiculous damn right. Do you remember, Zaren when I told you about the Hatton Garden heist? Is back? Oh I love an old crew of bankrupt old age pensioners. They concocted a heist in busted into a vault full of gems and untold riches. Um story I want to tell you today is very similar,

more criminal silver backs. Well, it's a bit of a crossover. It's sort of an origin story because we have a repeat offender. Were our first person to come back twice? Yeah? Did you know? Did you know they're recording us right now? Dave? What did you know that yet? Anyway, why would he do that? Well, we'll find out. So we have a repeat offender here. And do you remember the ringleader of the Hatton Gardens heist. Ringleader had a cool name he was. He had a car dealership in like a shabby sheek

rambling home. Yes, yes, the Governor none other than Brian Reader. I couldn't think of that part of his name. I got the nicknames. So Brian Reader a k a. The Governor was one of the masterminds behind the crazy bank robbery that I'm going to tell you about today. And I need you to also note that the Governor denied any involvement at all in this one. So when we first met him, we were talking about twelve with the Hatton Gardens heist. This is different. This is nineteen seventy

that he cooks this up. Oin Um. So he has this little gang going around stealings, doing those little stealings. One of the guys in his gang is named Anthony Gavin, you know, for his familiars. He was a photographer in his late thirties. At the time, he read a Sherlock Holmes short story written by Arthur Conan Doyle. Of course, another cross over here. It's just all woven together. It's called The Redheaded League. Oh yes, and this one, this

was very inspirational to all detectives. Well, it inspired old Tony Gavin. In the story, the thieves tunnel into a vault, but in the story they tunnel right into the arms of these detectives. So he's like, I can I can figure out a better way to do this. Now, another thing, I'd like you to note, the Holmes headquarters were on Baker Street right, correct, exactly. So An't has an idea. He figures out that he can pull off a tunnel heist way better than the crooks in the homes tale.

You know, everyone always thinks they're smarter than everybody else. He took this idea to the governor, and the governor he had, Governor, Young Governor, that's my new rap name had recently suffered a head injury when he slipped and fell. Well, so I don't mean to laugh at recently head injury. Here's why we're laughing, because because head injuries are no laughing matter, they can make a man strange for the

rest of his day. But the governor there were a lot of injuries involved in Hatton Gardens, and so that's why the bad luck was predetermined. So he slips and falls while he's escaping from a building that he's like scoping out a building for robbery. Someone catches sight of him and he's like runs and then boyk hits his head and has That's that's the sounds I just played on the recording. Um. So he couldn't he couldn't never get anything right. He's still though, with all his bumbling,

he's stone cold. Oh yeah, he's a hard man. Have seen as a clown. He's a veteran criminal exactly, even as a young man. So Gavin and the gov They go and they get this guy, Reginald Tucker, and he's a reggie. He's a used car dealer. Um. And then also he would say that his car dealer, he would say sometimes that his job was a company director. That's vague. Then there's this other guy, Thomas Stevens. He's another used car dealer. Just the whole clan of don't forget the

governor went and how to use car. I'm laughing, like all these guys are like, yeah, what do you do? I push used cars. I still use cars. I'm gonna use cars dealer. So Bobby Mills is another dude pushing warm cars, not hot cars. Warm Gently's Bobby Mills is another friend of the governors, so they bring him into this. Then there's Mickey Skinny GERVAISI sounds like a boy band Tommy. Mickey Skinny is a burglar alarm expert. Okay, you need

one of those always. Um. And then there are these two unidentified people to this day unidentified, one of whom was an explosives expert. This is totally Ocean's eleven. Yeah. It's also the Professionals Bank. It's everything. That's all the great like Gang Group movies, like, Okay, we need this professional, we need this expert. It's also you know, it's La La Land, which I don't know, I've never seen it. Oh that's the dancing oscar, the accidental whatever. Yeah. Um, okay.

So these two other mystery guys. One is named little Legs and the other one is named th h that's all we know of now. The th h they it was rumored was connected with a really corrupt Scotland yard detective inspector. But it's all umor in supposition was to be like tight with bad guys, tight with a sort of good guy. Okay, okay, I'm with it. So this rag tag bunch they get together, they decide they're going to target the Baker Street branch of Lloyd's Bank on

the corner of Baker Street and Marleybourne Road. Know what that means? Me too? At Baker Street. So December seven seventy, Reginald Tucker, car dealer slash company director. He goes into the bank and he opens a bank account with five pounds it's a good quantity of money. Then he uses the name G. Edwards, not his real name, and a fake home address to open this account. The bank doesn't

check the references that he supplied. They didn't notice that the address that he gave was actually a news agent's, you know, like a New Stork store. Whatever. They're like, yeah, I have an account. Great. Two months later, Tucker goes and he gets a safe deposit box at the Bank Inc. At number three seventeen. If you're taking notes letters that cost as two pounds fifty pence a month. Okay, so like the rent for the safe positive to let it to let exactly. He didn't keep much in it, but

it gave him access to the vault. Yes exactly, I'm with you. You know how easy how they do? So he'd sign in under his fake name and then they escort him to the vault two staff members Mr. Edwards. They'd used the two key thing and then they're like, you know what, We're going to leave you in this vault for your privacy, to look at your my little

pony collection. There are some white gloves, all your precious memories. Um. And so Tucker would go in there and his job was like memorizing the inside of the vault, drawing up a plan, coming up with sematic. Yeah. So he'd go into the vault just like he's a businessman. He'd wear a bowler hat and a pinstripe suit. You gotta love a costume. He's looking like the guy from them Great Painting. He's coming in with a bowler and he's assisting this puzz um. He would also carry an umbrella and he

used that to measure the inside of the vaults. Okay, so I'm just picturing John Kleee doing all of this and it's really working for but also would probably look like a dance routine where he's like setting the umbrella up, taking some steps down. Like this poor guy has nowhere to rehearse, so he comes in here. It also turns out that the floor tiles were a standard nine inches each and that was super helpful, so makes measuring a snap.

He Uh. He goes to the vault thirteen different times, and five times in the month before the heist, so he's just like constantly checking out his safe deposit box two times in the week before the heist. Now is this like a learning anything for the Bank of the don't this? This guy, he's a businessman, wants to come and then just feel his my little pony ponies, you know, tips his hat to him and goes in there and looks through his dust, his jewels or whatever he does. Yeah,

he has like old rinsed out yogurt containers. Did not but do you know, I picture everything, so now it's right there. You know, you're welcome, and he just like he looks at it and he remembers the good times. Such a good yo play Blueberry day. So that's what he's gotten his safe deploset box if he asked me. The vault at Lloyd's Bank Baker Street was built of reinforced concrete. It had two doors and it was behind a locked sliding grill, so you know it's pretty secure.

The main door had an alarm and a lock that was set to a timer, so no one, not even the employees, could open it outside of normal business, so you better not get stuck in there. He checks this all out. They find out too, that the bottom was eighteen inches. There's also another source that I found that said it was three ft of double reinforced concrete. The floor, yeah, or the bottom as I call it. I was wondering, like, you know what, excuse me, I need to go vacuum

the bottom from the walls of the bottom. You've been sweeping. The houses are rocking so impenetrable. They say, okay, And the bottom is not connected to an alarm system. The floor it was fancy, people call it the floor. No alarm system on the floor. Two doors down from the bank on Baker Street, there's a struggling leather good store. The store I just love struggling weather goods. You know, they're just trying to make the like, come on five, the hobo bag. This is not what it used to

be on the market. The store is called les Sack. See, this is why I'm thinking about that French. No, it's not sports sack. You know, that's all like the parachute material. Isn't this big in the eighties, But that's a different one. Sports sack. Oh, yes, I know you're talking about. It was a big eighties thing and I just am going to give a little bit of a reveal. Open up my world. That's the kind of wallet I can You're always and I'm so up to date. Anyway, Lasak going

out of business. I'm so shocked. The basement of the shop was at the same level as the bank vault. This is going to be handy, yeah, and they were only they weren't next door though there's two doors down. They're separated by a fast food restaurant called Chicken In. Chicken In and don't want to know it comes out I n M. It's like a where salesman Chicken come down the ricken in town and you're in London and you're like, we're kind of good poultry like me find

a home. They're like, come on in, and they just march them right into a fryar. It's a little bait and switch. The spot today is a taco bell. Oh a tradition going. Yeah, So the gang they recruit a

recently bankrupt businessman named Benny Wolf. Okay, you're gonna like, you're gonna think I'm making this up or to be like that gonna be Burnett, But I swear to you this is pretty much the plot of a movie with ever g Robinson from the thirties, and he has a leather good store that they use its next door to to break in. They go through the basement of the leather good store. Are you kidding me? Like you're telling

me that. I'm like, I've seen this. Maybe they wanted to sound smart by being like, oh, we got it from a short story. We were just sitting around reading. What is this film you talk about? No the cinema? Yeah, no, I think, well who knows? So he Benny Wolf convinces a former assistant of his named Molly Adams to put her name on the deed of the sack. He couldn't do it because he'd recently declared bankruptcy. So we have

our legitimate businessman, who is a legitimate exactly. So August one, the purchase goes through, he gets the shop, gang goes in, they close up shop, they hang science. They're like, we're going to reopen later in September. So you know, neighbor, it's eagerly remodeling. Come back soon. Friday, August the heist commences. So Stevens, who's the other car dealer. He'd been tasked with getting tools. He had to get a powerful jack. And what why are you laughing? You leveled your eyes

and be powerful jack. I was just talking and a thermal lance. You get it again, so you can take it again. I don't even know what does the thermal lance. I actually I do know. I just like how you can change meetings just with your tone of void completely. That was the first essay I ever wrote, and you had like it was like sixth grade you had to write an essay. I wrote a whole like persuasion piece on how the tone can make anything sexual. I was not allowed to turn next grade six. Well, I wrote

one in third grade, so sup about innuendo? You know? It was like, I'm so sorry for your teachers throughout the years. Oh yeah, as am I yeah. But Powerful Jack and Thermal Lance. Is that sounding familiar to you? It's time. Well it sounds like stars of a film, Powerful Jack and Thermal Lance because it's to Jack and Lance as her first names. I'm with you right there. I'm actually like, you know, who cares? Who knows? Listen. They're similar to the list of tools in the Hatton

Garden Heights. It's very similar. Okay, So Bobby Mills, the one who is old friends with the governor, he chickens out at the last minute. Governor has a hard time. I mean, he just could not get good guys. He does not have good crew retention. But they convinced him, okay, be the lookout. He could do practice runs. Yeah, now I hope, like remember the lookout from Hatton. That's what I'm saying, all right. So also, remember I told you the governor had a head injury during his recent escape. Well,

he's like, I can't dig head injury. I dented my brain, pan, I can't dig. So this is kind of shades of Kenny the diabetic from Patton Gardens. You know, they've all got these ailments. Now, let's take a break now that we've established all this, and when we come back, I'm going to tell you about how they set up their little plan. Hey Aaron, Hey, I'm back. My name is

Thermal Lance and I am powerful jock. That's where I think if we ever have to go somewhere and like sign in as something like drewry Duty, Oh no, it's not Elizabeth and it's Thermal Lance, they're like, oh, sorry, we got the wrong personal he and I'll walk away. What was I talking about? Baker Street, Yes, the robbery and the Yeah, okay, so Gavin the homes fan, Tucker, the guy who did the whole vault measuring, and then

one of the unnamed members. Yeah, they drilled through les Saks six inch concrete floor and then they hit Clay So next door chicken In. Um, not like Bobby Mills who was Chicken out. Hey, uh so the digger guys they realized that chicken In's foundation wall was actually lower than they had realized, so they had to dig under and around that before they got to the vault. Like you know, the I think chicken In is more heavily reinforced than Lloyd's Bank. Yeah, sounds like it. And they

kind of take their stuff. So when you're taking the chickens to their final reward, you wanted solid um. Gavin was apparently in super good shape. I guess he was also like a part time physical therapist. They had the um. He did most of the work and he was like, I'm pretty confident. He wore tight T shirts, no T shirt at all. Top. He later said that he lost almost two stones twenty eight pounds twelve or fourteen pounds. I can never remember water weight. Did he lose a limb?

I So remember they get started on a Friday. They keep digging till Monday morning, and then they're like, okay, you know what, let's let's keep going next weekend. Let's take a break. This is our weekend gig um, very big weekend project. It takes, you know, digging a hole takes a long time. You always see on TV and movies there's like a criminal digs a grave for someone.

It's all clean, smooth walls six ft deep. That's not reality, no no, and they do it in like an hour, you know, or what's supposed to be in our you know that a TV show that's guilty of this, Sons of anarchy, oh, yeah, the fastest hole diggers in the world. Yeah, they like toss someone to shovel and then they cut to them in an undershirt, like wiping their forehead with their arms as they stand in that perfectly chiseled out,

super deep hole. Um, and then there's always a pile of dirt next to it that in no way is the same volume as the amount of dirt, but it definitely looks like an industrial equipment had lifted it out of the hole and piled it there. And then they like toss them in and they're like, okay, fill it up, you know, and whatever. If they did that in real life, it would be sort of this rounded, lumpy thing that's like three f three weeks later. Yeah, anyway, they come back,

they go to work next weekend. They dug a forty foot twelve inch by fourteen inch tunnel under the vault. Twelve inch Wait, that doesn't seem big enough for people, but that's what I read, and so the tunnel was called a remarkable piece of engineering during the later trial. It had to be bigger than that, otherwise they're like slithering through turned shoulder and I separated shoulders two ft by four feet makes me comfortable. Let's go with that.

You know, it doesn't really matter. They dug a tunnel um who knows, who cares the crew. They also carved out of space seven ft wide and five ft high directly under the vault's workable. Yeah, and that's where they could work. They set up the jack, the powerful jack um, a couple of railway ties that I suppose they brought with railway ties. That's like, I guess pieces of the ground that was like too wet to support the pressure of the drilling and the ties kept sinking into the ground.

We have some so siden's issues. They also tried using the thermal leaves um, but it too could not break through the concrete. Yeah, so they're like, guess what, all right, we're running out of time. Let's go next weekend into this, so we'll regroup. Are they going to have to hit up a home improvement big box store? Oh no, I mean, I'm figuring the best way for them at this point is is to reconsider the use of tools like maybe

some explosives. Ha ha ha. See you should have been running this from the beginning, right, so check it out. It's taken them through weekends. They're able to dig down there below the vault. The tools aren't working. It's too damp with chicken grease. So they call in the explosives expert. Nice shape charges, that's your answer. I'm gonna go ahead and say that that guy was little legs. Yeah, just like that, and he dorfon explosives, little legs. He gets

some gelic knight. Okay, jelic knight. Hey Elizabeth, what's gelic knight? Acting like you know, I'm gonna play it cool, like, oh yeah, jelic knight. That's that's the right choice. That's what I go with. It's either thermite or what you say or boom boom powder um well. Wikipedia defines gelic knight, also known as blasting gelatine or simply jelly. Are you ready for this, Cheli? I don't think I can handle

this kind of heat? They say. It's an explosive material consisting of colade in cotton dissolved in either nitroglycerin or nitro glycol and mixed with wood, pulp and salt peter. It was invented in eighteen seventy five by Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel Oh on his way to T and T. Also invented the dynamite in today's society. Now that I'm

doing all the bad essay things. I had an uncle who taught me how to make explosives out of like common household ingredients like styrofoam and stuff, And this one sounds a lot like a recipe he taught me. I'm wondering if he's like free verst Off of that. Probably Riffin. Uh so little Legs, you got himself, some gellic Knight, and he's ready to blow the absolute cottage cheese out

of that Bault floor. So the group, they're concerned that the explosion is going to be heard outside, so they rent walkie talkies so they can coordinate with their outside I'd look out, scaredy cat Mills and uh Friday, September t pm, Lloyd's Bank closes again for the weekend game comes back for weekend activities. Mills he's posted up at the top of ninety four Baker Street that had a clear view at the bank, so they really aren't that

far from they're living it. Do you know what was located at ninety four Baker Street a few years prior to this. I'm gonna go with a turkey shack. It was the original Apple store where the Beatles had opened their short lived Apple boutique. Oh yeah, like Apple records of the original Yeah, that's that's completely completely irrelevant to what I'm talking about. But that's my that's my jam.

Thank you for the information. So the gang drills holes in the concrete under the vault, fills them with gelic Knight. They connected back to a generator in La Sachs basement using this series of cables tubes. Uh Mills, he's keeping an eye on things, and they set off the explosives around twelve thirty am Saturday, September eleven, coinciding with a green light and moving traffic to help block the noise. So Mills is like waiting till the light changes. That

truck comes, Go go, go truck. They get lucky. The whole that they ended up making in the bottom of the vault um it had a bank trolley directly over it and that helped muffle the sound. So all these things working together, they get in the vault. They go to work. The governor. He's an expert at opening safe deposit boxes. They worked all day. Okay, maybe I'm wrong here, but I didn't think there was such a thing as an expert in getting into safe depositible. I thought you

did pry your way. You know what. You didn't think there was such a thing as emergency circumcision, or at least unaware of learning, constantly learning. Stay curious. Remember that he didn't get to use that expertise though, decades later for Hatton Gardens. Remember he just noped out of there. Yeah, so this time he did the hard work, he put in the effort way to hustle. Good game, Good game, zaren. I want you to close your eyes, okay, just for no reason, I want you to picture it. It's eleven

o'clock on a Saturday night. A man named Robert Rowlands is patting around his fourth floor apartment on Whimpole Street. Now he's going to settle in for his typical late night routine of turning on his American Forces radio, putting some vaseline on his feet, going on his sox. Yes, he's cutting loose on a Saturday night there, bubby. Uh, he's really hoping to tune into Radio Luxembourg makes him feel fancy. Instead, he hears a man's voice in English

coming through. Clearly, the man is talking about a vault Luton whatnot that is not Radio Luxembourg. Know your pal Robert comes to the conclusion that he's listening to a robbery taking place nearby. That is so exciting for him. I love this for his Saturday night. So he calls the local precinct. They don't take him seriously and they're like, you know what, okay, yeah, sure you're here and record it and get back to us, and then they like

snicker and hang up the phone. It makes me wonder if maybe he'd called them previously with other outlange, or if he started off with okay, Normally on a Saturday, I like to listen to Radio Luxenberg, but this Saturday they're like, oh man, you know yeah, we get a lot of these. So here's the thing. Though conveniently, Rolands has a cassette recorder at his house of because he uses it to practice his Spanish. What he just talks

to him cute yeah? Did he like listens to himself, gets better at how he says in Spanish according to his own ear. But he doesn't speak Spanish or don't want to hear it to correct. Well, I don't know, Like when I was in high school in French class. We used to have to read like questions and then answer them on a cassette and then this is you're seeing how old I am? And then leave him with the teacher. And she was supposed to like listen to

them to see if not only were we writing it? Yeah, and I just didn't study and this isn't senior year, and so every question that came up, I go, oh, I don't know. Yeah, it didn't fly, didn't it didn't. Um. So he's like this one man party machine. He's got a cassette recorder. He records the thieves arguing mostly with Mills outside about whether to stop for the night er keep going. He must be hearing this the most random stuff. We gotta light okay, no light? Yeah, he has the recording.

He calls the cops again, but this time he calls the main line at Scotland Yard. He doesn't trust the precincts, and um, they take him seriously. They send officers over. Now it's interesting. Later the police threatened to prosecute Mr Rollins for listening to an unlicensed radio station. Is that a thing? Radio station crossover? Okay? Lloyd's bank, though, gave him a pound reward. Good job, dude. So in the

morning September twelve, Sunday, the thieves start talking again. They're telling Mills, we're going to finish off here in the bank and uh, we shall be coming out early this afternoon and you'll just have to bluff bluff your way straight off the road. Yeah. There's this book called One Last Job, written by two guys from the Daily Mirror, Tom Petaphor and Nick Summerland. They said quote police needed

technical help and fast. They asked the BBC and the Post Office for assistance in tracking down the broadcasts in hope of catching the burglars in the act. We did receive considerable assistance, but the equipment they had was the type which was not much help. We were told by one of the radio detection experts that we would search an area within a seven mile radius of Mr Rowland's flat, and this involved a huge number of banks and similar premises.

That advice left police with an area of one hundred and fifty four square miles of central London to search. It contained hundreds of banks, and officers began the process of contacting the head offices of all of them. Right they contacted nine hundred banks. Oh yeah, that's that's a lot of man. So three thirty or four that Sunday, the police show up at Lloyd's. But everything looks fine

on the outside, much like Hatton Gardens. The vaults timelock meant that like no one could get in there anyway. So fine, the police leave. The gang finishes up their work. They packed their loot, their booty into a nearby van, and they drive to Tucker's house to divvy things up. In all, they are said to have stolen an estimated one point five million pounds closer they think to three million. That's a pretty big booty. Cash, jewelry, gold, other valuables. Sorry,

it was right there, it was perfect. I set it up. You knocked it out of the park. Um all these other valuables again quote unquote music boxes. The other thing, too, is a lot of the people who lost stuff wouldn't say what they lost. That's why they think it was a lot more. This is a common This is common with the in the safe deposit boxes are like what was in it? Family photos? I mean I can tell you the value, we would need it itemized. I can't

do that. So let's take a moment. You're gonna listen to some ads, just you know, sit and enjoy them. When we come back, I'm going to tell you how it all fell apart for these goog calls. Okay, okay, Monday sept do we want to whatever? Nine o'clock in the morning, a Lloyd's Bank employee opens the vault doors to find everything in disarray, as well as a hole in the floor. The police also discovered walkie talkies tools they left. That's loads of excavated dirt, sounds of stuff,

a powerful jack, powerful jack. They just left everything. This is the before DNA evidence. So they're like, yeah, whatever dusted. I don't give up, but I mean you could you could resell some of that stuff. I don't think they're worried about profit at that point. They're worried about money. Well, yeah, I know, I'm with you. Want not well they could give that to other criminals, to the criminal Tool Bank forward.

Based on the crime, the police presumed that the thief had to have inside knowledge of the vault and the bank though is like, you know what, we are not giving out the box holders names or any other information. Yeah. Uh. The bank was also unhelpful in dealing with property that had been strewn around on the floor, right, They just piled it up on tables outside the vault and they took possession of it all without police involvement. What do you mean, So they just said, like this is now

a bank property because it's on our floor. They just like scooped it up and put it in the pirate like nobody looks that's evidence, don't check um. And so one box holder, he said he went to go check and see if his valuables were on the table, his blackmail photos. No one checked his I D And he found that jewelry that was like on this pile had fallen into trash cans next to the desk. Yeah, it's

so sloppy. So finally a list of two and ten box holders was given to the police, but the police didn't think it was a full list, so they asked again. Then they get the names of two hundred sixty of two hundred and sixty eight box holders. So they're just like that the queen and her cousin, well around one hundred of the box holders. They declined to report their losses, declined to specify the full extent of the loss. They

won't file anything with the cops. The police used a network of informants to gather information on who robbed the bank, and pretty soon they came up with Gavin and Tucker, main guy and the one with the bank account. How did they informants informants every time? So on the morning of Friday, October nine one, the police watched Tucker hand over a bag to two men. They swoop in, they arrest the guys and there's thirty two thou pounds in cash in the bag. Yeah. Tucker gets arrested later that day.

He confessed that the cash from earlier was from the bank, but he said he wasn't part of the robbery. Got the cream. Yeah, So Gavin and Steve is they're arrested October Gavin said, look, I only dug the tunnel. I'm just the diggerman, and Stevens said that he had only supplied the tools. I went out, I got them nuts and then there you go. So Wolf that's the bankrupt businessman who rented the sack. Yeah, he was also arrested.

Totally denied involvement. He's like, I'm just a humble leather salesman. I am, but a bankrupt businessman. Exactly the Governor Mills. Two mystery men never caught arrested. Yeah, apparently, though the name of the explosives expert involved was given to the police, but he wasn't arrested either. Yeah. It's later alleged, though, that two senior officers in the case pocketed a million pounds in diamonds from Baker Street in exchange for letting

those guys off the hook. I think that they greased the wheels with that. Only around two hundred and thirty one thousand hounds of the stolen goods were ever recovered millions of right, and the cops can consider that a success because I got some back, right, Yeah, and the insurance covers the rest, we would hope. So the case goes to trial January three, Gavin Tucker Stevens. They all plead guilty, and they're convicted and sentenced to twelve years

in prison each year. But they hold the bag. They don't. They don't make snitch on everybody else. Nobody snitches on the Governor. Stevens later appealed and he was able to reduce his sentence to eight years. Um Wolf. He pleads not guilty, convicted eight years. In that book, One Last Job they said that quote. In the years after Baker Street, a number of myths have grown up around the job. One of the earliest misconceptions surrounded an alleged police cover

up in the aftermath. It's been claimed that a D notice was issued asking the press not to publish any detail of the raids on grounds of NASH Security m national security. For what reason. Well, the radio guy Richard rawlins, he said the police confiscated his recording and he said there was also this this gag order on it, but he thought it was just an excuse to hide police incompetence. Okay.

Former Scotland Yard Detective Inspector David Woodland, he wrote in his twenty fifteen book Crime and Corruption at the Yard. He said that m I five had placed the government gag order, the d notice on all press, effectively banning any further reporting dude to national security. So this keeps popping up this national security. What we're in these safety deposit boxes. And also that they these guys go to prison. So whatever they found, they couldn't have been too aware

of it because they otherwise they would have disappeared. To write The Guardian, UH and the Mirror, they both said that they were approached directly by senior government officials and told to drop the story. The press or you know, agencies were asked to keep things confidential. Um namely, they didn't want anyone to know that Rowlands had made that recording, but they told they wrote about it anyway, what did they care? So whatever happens four days after the robbery,

reporting mysteriously stops and just cuts it off. Many people later speculated that the reason for that d notice was because compromising photos of Princess Margaret had been found. This ringing a bell for you, that driver, right, So there was also according to that book, One Last Job. The rumor was that black power and civil rights activist Michael X had compromising photos of the Queen's sister, Princess Margaret on holiday with her lover, Roddy Llewellyn, and that he

stored them in the Baker Street vault. And he said that m I five organized the break in to spare the royal family's blushes. So it's not even like they're The whole break in was just to get the pictures of Princess Margaret back. Now, what you're also thinking of. Another alternate theory is that there were photos of Princess Margaret with infamous London gangster turned actor John Bindon. Yes, that's the story we heard. So, yeah, Zarin, you and I were once in the lift in Los Angeles. Our

driver was an Englishman. He had wild stories about it.

Oh my god. Yeah he's talking. You're talking about the two guns Benton because of his enormous and then he and yeah, and Princess Margaret was like so winded, and they were like in Jamaica and they're doing all the nudest stuff and they were on Michael X, the Black Power activists, and he has all the stuff where he was basically not in war but trying to like blackmail the UK government and then he gets involved in a whole other thing and then comes to his own terrible end.

But yes, that story was insane. He had crazy insight, talked about the whole break in and the tapes that were in apparently the boxes. He talked and because he knew them, Yeah, I know, he knew the dude he knew. Yeah, yeah, he knew Benton. Yeah, he was the dry It was a photographer, like a fashion fashion dude back in the day. And he used to drink with Benton in the pubs to just come in and be like just the most charming, carousing figure, and you can see why Princess Margaret would

go for him. And then there was the really dark stuff he started getting into. We were like, ohh, I don't okay, yeah, it got a little uncomfortable. Some of this turned into one of those aber driver moment where you like, I can't believe I'm paying for this. So that is the Baker Street robbery that takes I can't believe forever to hear it. I was waiting and waiting, what's your ridiculous takeaway? And it took me so long to catch up. I'm over here standing in the shadow,

like what's going on? Why is it dark? Oh my god, I've heard almost the entire story. And then the Princess Margaret had all clicked. I was like, wait a minute to break in to cover up, and he said it was yes, there, I love this one. My takeaway, since you asked, is the unsinkable spirit of the Governor. I'm loving the guy he gets busted for his first crime when he's eleven years old. I feel recall that was

his first bust. Criming was in his bones. He'd never give it up, and like he wasn't the best at it, but gosh darn it, he's going to give it as all. But he's still tough. He learned to walk on a getaway, that's right. He did, and then he fell and hurt his head. That is it for today. That's all I have. Thank you. You can find us online at Ridiculous Crime

on both Twitter and Instagram. If you have a tip for us about a ridiculous crime, or if you want to confess to a ridiculous crime, you can email us ridiculous Crime at gmail dot com. Tune in next time. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zarin Burnett, produced and edited by demolitions expert Dave Kuston. Research is by former LASAK floor manager Marissa Brown. The theme song is by Mysterious Company directors Thomas Lee and Travis Dutton.

Kit of producers are Ben You're Sherlock and I'm Watson Bolan and Noel No, You're Sherlock and I'm Watson Brown. We disquiet say it one more time, We dequeous Crow. Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeart Radio. Four more podcasts to my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.