Ridiculous crime is a production of My Heart Radio Zaren you know it's ridiculous. Yes, I do that. Bananas are a good source of anti matter. There potassium and anti That's where you actually get the anti matter is from the potassium. The potassium gives off positrons, and the positrons qualify as anti matter. So when you eat a banana, you're also eating anti matter. That's totally ridiculous. Yeah, I like that one. I knew that you would like that one because I heard it coming out of your I can tell you another one. Okay, hit me already, Ellen Pompeo telling Denza Washington Listen, MF I run this set and she's doing her whole bit about him not being a good director on her set and she's just you know, craze anatomy. That to me was ridiculous. Yeah, that is ridiculous anti matter. And it's her name again, Ellen Pompeo. It was like twenty seconds ago Anti Pompeo, Anti anti matter Pompeo. Okay, so that is You've given me two ridiculous things, and I totally concur You're welcome, no rebock reboot. So you know what else is ridiculous hit me with it, pulling off an enormous heist and then only getting caught because you couldn't shut up about it. Did my family do this? Maybe? H This is Ridiculous Crime a podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heists, and cons. It is always always murder free and always always always ridiculous. Alright, Saron, you like Ocean's eleven movies, right, the series of films, both the originals and the reboot original and reboot. Yeah, I like, yeah, I like the original Frank Sinatra Oceans eleven. I like the the the George Clooney, Brad Pitt Oceans eleven, twelve, and thirteen. Right. I liked also Oceans eight with Rihanna, and like, I you know me, I love criminals. I love crime. I like Caper's Heist and it was right up and there was I love Rihanna. Steven Soderberg is a hell of a director. He can make something that is stylish fluff like that into something that feels like actually meaningful. You cared about those characters, when in most cases a lot of filmmakers would not have put in the work to make you care about them. And that's the films would not have been a hit. He made us care about characters that should have been cardboard cutouts. Well, in speaking of another director, you like Guy Ritchie movies, right? Oh? I love Guy Richie, same thing. He also can take characters and turn that our interest into his characters into a world you just want to go. I mean like brick Top. Come on now, now, how do you feel about the movie Cocoon? Oh my god, you're just going through my favorites another see this is another crime moving people. Don't think about it. They were smuggling aliens. That was an alien smuggling ring run by a bunch of gray hairs. Love it all right? So now what if I told you that there was a real life combo of all three? I need to go jack up? Feel right now? How how are you feeling right now? In your body? I'm all excited, like a thrilliest running through me like I just stuck my finger in the socket again exactly. So what I'm gonna lay on you as the story of the Hatton Garden heist. Oh, I like this at garden hest. I want you to imagine this. It's you got four pals, four old age pensioners, gathering in a London pub called the Castle. And that's like a traditional pub, but it's got this really lovely roof terrace. It's in the Angel section of Islington Tony neighborhood in London. Yes, that's what. And so there's just you know, the four older gentleman sitting down together for points on a regular basis, super common site all over the UK pub culture. Exactly. These guys are different. They're even more your kind of guys. You're planning a heist. Oh my god, they sent my guys. So let me introduce you to them. First. There's Brian Reader. They call him the Governor. Yeah, I love it. This is so guy Ritchie. He's seventy three years old. Time. Don't laugh at that. I'm not laughing at the age. I love. His first arrest was for breaking and entering at the age of eleven. He did nine years in prison for conspiracy to handle stolen goods after he and another guy helped launder stolen gold, bullion and diamonds stolen from a warehouse near Heathrow. Oh by the airport. Word. So he's got, you know, credentials. He gets out of prison and then he moves into this like rundown mansion in Dartford, Kent, Dartford. That one word Dartford. It's Dartford in in Kent, oh, Dartford in Stratford, and so Dartford is the town. And so he runs a used card viewership out of his house. You know, do you know who else is born in Dartford? No, Liam Gallagher, Keith Richards what, Yeah, it's sick Ground. Yeah. So the governor, he's a bon vivante because he dresses all flashy and he's got this dark criminal past. But he's living in like a shabby sheek mansion in Kent, you know, twenty seven miles outside of London. He's just like a fabulous character. I like the Governor. Then there's Danny Jones. Danny's fifty seven at the time. He's like the spring Chicken. He's also a lifetime criminal. He specializes in jewelry another stolen goods. He's a total oddball. Well, yeah, because like one of his little quirks is that he went to bed. He went to sleep in his mother's dressing gown and a fez at night. I was still hanging on mother's dressing gown. Try, what's that picture like, and then he has to find his comfort zone is safe space. But he didn't really go to bed per se, because he slept right on the floor, so he put on his mother's dress to sleep on the floor. Danny Man, he he studied crime like a kid cramming for a forgotten bio exam. Did research, he read books, he watched movies, he studied golden diamond prices, and then he was also researching like which tools are the best for cutting through which material that happened to be used to make a vault. So yeah, Danny, he's going he's the young, studious one with a fez on. Then we have Kenny Collins. Kenny Kenny is seventy two and at the table at the pub seventy two years old. He's another career criminal. Yet again he was like your classic hard man, British hard man, right, so he goes everywhere with his Staffordshire bull Terrier. It's kind of like it's not like an American Staffordshire terrier, like a pit bull. It's like a cross between an English bulldog and like an old English terrier. I'm kind of imagining more like a pub dog kind of yeah, but like a little muscleman. Yeah, exactly a little square but kind of like a muscle. The dog's name is Dempsey, like the fighter. Yeah, he's but Kenny is also diabetic and he has some memory issues, do all Kenny? Yeah? Such is aging? Does Kenny not have a nickname? Kenny? Mind is? They like Brian is the governor and then Danny is Danny because they love the diminutives, Danny Kenny. And that takes us to the last in our quartet, Terry Perkins. Terry Terry Terry, Danny Terry. He's sixty four. He's another career criminal like it, and he's also a one time prison escape. Yeah, go on, Terry, he's been on He was on the lamb at one point for seventeen years. Yeah, I'm like this for real. It's not like he like slips out in the get back here and then you him back here. Yeah, he was like on the lamp. Now, he and the governor had like done a bunch of jobs together, so you know, they were like professional acquaintances and it grew to a deeper friendship. You could say that they were ste beautiful. No, that was incredible. So they're they're actually some other dudes that they recruited to help out. Yeah. Sure, but they're not like our core group. But there is one important youngster fifty two years young. His name is Michael Seed. Practically a boy, yeah glad, but he's known on the streets is Basil Basil. Of course he was British. I'm like Basil Basil. It looks like Basil. It's Basil. And he's the son of this professor. And he studied physics and electronics at Nottingham University. Um. But when he like he did twenty one months back because he sold ten tabs of acid and some weed to a friend, was his friend of cop, I don't know a square sitch. And then like, so what he does like since then, like he's he's like fixing TVs and electronics and then you know, I guess just at home for people who are like I tell he's broken with screw driver. Yeah, and then he gets into the jewelry trade. Like what does he do in the jewelry trade? He said he quote recycled jewelry because he was good with his hands. It's like recycled jewelry. Huh, I remember that he is recycled. Um, he didn't have a bank account, he didn't claim benefits, didn't pay taxes, and in the words of Steven Stills, he didn't do business that don't make him smile. That's a good rule, that's basil. Right. So, um, all these guys they're meeting up at the pub. Three years go by. It's a lot of points, right if something for these guys have imagined yet, yeah, spring comes along. They think they're ready. They think they're ready. So this whole three year period they're basically plotting to do this job, or they're just like they're plotting, like the whole time. They're sitting there and they're plotting. So they're parked in this pub you imagine, like Dempsey's at their feet, there's a fire going, or they're up on the roof deck on a lovely day, you know, enjoying a pint, and they're like drawing like schematics on bar napkins or like totally sure, and they had like I imagine they had like a chalkboard and would plot it out there and like drop it over when people come by, exactly, or they would pretend like it was like football as we say, soccer, like you know, diagrams of moves or what are set ups, I don't know what you'd say, formations. And then yeah, so they've got this whole thing. They have their eyes set on a place called Hatton Garden and I'm going to get to that in a in a while, but let's go back to them plotting. So you have these four criminal masterminds who've got lifetimes of experience behind them, and Basil, Basil, he's not up in there yet, like they're kind of keeping him outside of it, giving in the information he needs, but he's like they're clutchy young guy that they're going to use. But so these guys take everything that they've learned about diamonds, about gold, about breaking into places. Don't forget the governor had broken into a warehouse outside a heathrow um. So they're taking all this and they've got their eyes on Hatton Garden. I don't think, I don't hear them having is a fence and you have to be able to get away with your crime. Well they do, yeah, they do. And those are the sort of the associated people. So let me tell you a little bit about Hatton Garden first. So it's this this like seven story building, sixty tenants, most of them are jewelers. Um, but the basement is this room that's completely full of safe deposit boxes and in those boxes gold jewelry. Jem, I don't think you would know the answer to this. Why why so many bankers all living in the same building or jewelers all living in the same building. I think it's like we have. I think it's probably akin to like the Diamond District somewhere where they're you know, they're all in the same location and it's like a little market place. I don't know, but yeah, so interesting. But the safe deposit boxes are the key here, and that's what these guys are really like focused on, and that's what they're plotting. So I'm gonna walk you through how this all plays out, but let's take a quick break first. Alright, So we got our four dudes, the Governor, Terry, Ny and Danny Yes, and they're all hanging out at the pub and they've come up with this plan. So we jumped forward. It's Thursday, April two. It also happens to be Holy Week, and that means the next day is both Good Friday and it's also the start of Passover. Do it up, double up? So they're locking everything up in that building and they're heading out for a long Easter passover weekend. Brian Reader a k a. The Governor, he's prepping for his own kind of religious holiday. At this point. He uses his senior free travel pass. It's like a bus pass seniors, and he gets on a bus from his place out in Kent and goes into London, like an hour and a half journey, but you know it's free. Seniors fly free. And the Governor meets up with Danny, Kenny, Terry, and then this other guy named Carl Wood outside the building. Carl is like a part time criminal, not a full time pro like the other guys. Yeah, he's got one foot in and they're like pulling him in. So the Governor, Danny, Terry, Kenny, Carl, Um, they're all ready to go. They get all dressed up as workers, hard hats, jumpsuits, reflective vests. They jump into a white van that Kenny's driving, Kenny the diabetic, and they pull up to the side entrance to the building. Now they unload all their tools and stuff like that. Um. Kenny goes across the street to an office building and they've secured this location where he's going to be the lookout and keep an eye on the scene, which is important. You know, this is a big, big hei. Yeah, he's taken it a little easy. The reason why he's the lookout and not like down in there is because you know, he has the sugar got the sugar diabetes and he's got a touch of dementia. Oh this is not sounding like a good lookout. Yeah, and so like the problem is he gets up to the post and then he falls asleep up there's not a good lookout, Kenny. Kenny has done hard, like a lot of good work in his criminal career, but this is not it. You can keep him back in the pad. You haven't count everything when they get the roles. Think he could have just been like the stenographer at those things and you know, just maybe was their paperman. You know, I did a counterfeiting so um basil. Remember him, he's already in the building. He doesn't meet up with him outside because he's already up in there. He has his own costume on, okay, and it's not like a workerman costume. He's wearing a red wig like Ronald McDonald or like Lucile Ball. I don't know. I'm kind of thinking it's like a chucky wig when I closed my eyes in magic and a flat cap, like you know, he's seeing for a C d C. And then a jumpsuit jumpsuit, like a work jumpsuit. Yeah, but like we can also pretend that it's like an urban outfitters, you know, fashion jumps Can I pretend it's an evil can evil jumps with stripes and stars? Yes, let's okay, that's our visual image. Hot. So he's disabled the alarm system, disabled the cameras, but he forgets about two CCTV cameras oops, ones on the fire exit that they've been coming in and out of, and the others on the second floor. O man, So mean, while he's got this chucky wig on, their entrances and exits are being filmed the whole time. Yeah, but don't worry, guys, I disabled all the cameras exactly. So the other thing they disabled is the elevator for a bunch of old men to go downstairs. Well no, like it's like, I guess they did it because they didn't want people sneaking up on him down They accessed the basement vault by like going through the shaft the elevator shaft, so they got underneath the car and then dropped. I guess they all like it's very Ocean's eleven there in like Matt damon black jumpsuits and if don Cheedle fell asleep. So they want to make sure that no one can sneak up on them. They get into the basement and they reach the airlock, you know, like kind of think it's got like ahip, yeah, and maybe they're I don't know, there's a lot of stuff basement. So they cut the telephone cable and rip out like this GPS antenna and then they only but what they did only partially shut down the security system, like it would have worked exactly exactly. They're like whatever that antenna is for ham radio yankee down. They're like, no, I think that's important. So like the alarm goes off because they like they cut the telephone wire, but like, guys, we use fiber optic cable and then everyone's going to call this one in and so like the alarm goes off. Head of security shows up, but he doesn't see anything off. The four doors forced open, there's nobody like huddled around the front sign of fourth entry. So when the cops come and they're like, what's all this then, and the head of Securities like nas a false alarm. Now, one other thing I should mention is that like a couple of days before this happened, this is on the fourth, on the second, Um, there was a gas main break in the street. So it caused all this chaos. Reasonable, Yeah, and it was like good cover for them, and it was totally unrelated. It's not like they sent Kenny down there to bang on it with a pipe until it broke and then like stagger out. Um. No, they had nothing to do with it. But it was just like good timing. And so I think that's why the police were just thinking, like man, these alarms are going off everything. This was fast and furious. Then Diesel would have him break the pipe exactly different, he would have chewed right through it underground. So everyone goes home and goes to sleep security wise, Um, but the gang at this point is still getting closer and closer getting into the vault. Um. There's like a foot and half of concrete between them and all the boxes in the fault. They're going through the concrete, yeah, They're not like going through the door. Yeah. And they're not trying to also get the door off. The hand is not trying to open the lock through the wall essentially, and so the half Yeah, and like when you have to do that, what do you what do you use? Jack camera? No, it's so what you always carry on you that hill D D D three circular power drill exactly, Yeah, in the holster at all times. And I got the carbon to change out and complete my diamonds completely. So that's what they get out right, They two and a half hours later, they've drilled three overlapping circles. Okay, so they're trying to dig, trying to give it the value that is, yeah, and that, but the whole was not really well placed. They drilled into the back of this bolted down wall of safe deposit boxes and that blocked their entry. So they thought they were just like going to drill these three holes that will make like a larger kind of clover shape they can go through. And then yeah, and so I'm guessing they didn't have blueprints. Maybe Kenny had them right. I Mean, the thing is is like, as I'm telling this, it's sounding worse and worse. Trust me. These guys are these guys are crack criminals on crack criminals. So you know, they're like they've hit this bolted down wall and they're like, oh my god, what I need to do. Wait a second, blimey, but wait, we had we brought our hydraulic ram, you guys. Oh never mind, problem solved, Yeah, no big. So they go to set it up and the pump on the ram was broken. They didn't test their so they took a break, had a cuppa. Yeah. So I guess this was like I don't know what day it is whatever, on that Friday. They left the building at like eight in the morning, so this was over all night. Yea. Yeah, they're working out it and like they're sweating through their undershirts and they're just down to like their topless if they folded down the jumpsuits, so they're wearing like their arms like long grain nipple hairs. I was right there with you till you said longer. They're all wearing chucky wigsture. Never mind. I know we're getting further and further away from the truth. I need to bring us back in. So Danny woke Kenny up and was like, we gotta the pumps. The we need a new pump because the ram's broken, so they go off to being Q and buy a new ram pump um. The governor he's like, all right, so we've been in here overnight and it's all screwed up. And if we go back in because they left to like figure out, Okay, how are we going to do this? Governors like, you know what, we go back in there, we're caught. I don't want to do that, because he's like, we we already successfully got in and out, but we didn't get what we wanted. But if we go back in and try and do this again, they're going to catch us. So he takes off, he gets on the train and he goes home. Okay, that's your team leader. Nope, Dawn out of there, that's leader the governor. I'm picturing George Cline going I'm taking my senior bus ticket and going hotly. I was like, yeah, you know what, I'm I'm getting too old for this. So the rest of the game come back the next day, Saturday. It's ten pm. You know, they're doing the night shift on it. But don't forget, it's this long holiday weekend. Everyone's checked out. No one's gonna be coming through except for the security team maybe right, and they already think, well, you know, there's so Saturday, April four, also Terry's birthday, the Big six seven Terry. Congrats Terry. They try to get back in the building at this point and the door that they've been using is locked. Like they thought it was just going to be open. They're like, we don't lock it behind you. We're going we gotta run down and get a new pump, but don't lock it. Yeah, they lot a brick to hold it open. Carl at this point Carl would also he's like the roadie. He's like, I've had enough, I'm out of here. He takes off, so they're down to three plus Basil. That leaves Danny, Kenny, Terry and Basil and Ronnie, Bobby, Rickey and Mike urging you to cool it down. Basil is able to get them in the building again. He's like, I did it before, you guys. Give me a moment. I've been watching YouTube block picking videos, you know, I like to recycle jewelry or whatever it is. He does. Okay, so he gets the building open again and they get in there. Kenny, what's Kenny do? He goes back across the street to act as lookout falls asleep again. Um, but they have all these cool new tools. They're ready to go, and they're able to pry the boxes out of the way and get into the vault. They moved that whole wall. Good on them. Um. They originally wanted to spend three days in the vault over the week someone else I know that weekend rock. There are nine safe deposit boxes in that vault, and they thought, Okay, we're going to spend three days in here, let's just take them all. But now they have one night, and so they figured, okay, let's get like seventy three of them. I don't know how they come up with that number. I think they probably just looked at a section of the wall and we're like these, um, maybe the biggest boxes they could find. Interesting. That's how I would do it, But I'm not them, and I don't have a diminutive name. Tease. So they finish up on Monday morning, super early. They wheel everything out of the building, tools, the loot everything in large garbage cans. It's convenient. You know, people are going to look twice as I'm a pushing garbage exactly, and and they you see like these, you know, older gentlemen and like the work clothes. They're like, yeah, they've never got the weekend. So Kenny wakes up decides to drive home in the White Key. Now Kenny, by the way, he doesn't want to drive alone on this one. And he's there with an associate of his name, William Billy the Fish Lincoln the Fish. And you know there's a great story behind that nickname. Yeah, you know what a great story is. This is like you're gonna it'll blow your mind. Why they call him Billy the Fish because he hangs out at fish markets on Friday. So when I said a great story, maybe I should take that back the dumbest. So Billy the Fish is also the brother of Kenny's girlfriends slash life partner, so he's like, this kind of has to get the family involved. He's like, you know what you got going on there, Kenny, And he's like, oh, man, Billy stink all right, you know, because don't forget what are we Monday? Now he's he's been sitting at the fish market. Um. Billy the Fish, though, is a career criminal. He's not just a guy who frequents fish markets um. But he also like the rest of the gang has some medical ailments. Um, they include incontinence, and he also has had a recent double hip replacement. This is your escape team. Okay, Yeah, So they're driving. He's riding with Kenny, who's falling asleep. It's riding with the King. They all go to their respective places. They divide up the loop and um, even the ones who bailed out on the second attempt, the Governor Carl, they get They get their share because you know, they did some heavy lifting, they just didn't finish it out. And if you don't pay them to flip on you exactly or worse. And so April seventh, Tuesday morning, everyone's finally coming back to work. They're like, oh, how is your weekend? It was so good? And then they're like zolys. They walk into the vaul. Jesus just it's just chaos in the vault. They're like, they, I think they probably went in continent themselves when I was continent and I am no longer. So they called the cops, obviously, and the question is will these guys get away with it? I'm gonna go, well, it's unlikely that they'll get away with it. If we're talking about it, so that that's your big my first clue. I know, Colombo over here, I put that together. Let's stop for a moment, Let's revel in the gray panther power of this gang. And when we come back, I'm going to fill you in on the aftermath of this ridiculous caper. Now we're talking about seventy three empty safe deposit box. That is a lot of angry jewelers. Well, and the thing is, these guys to the jewelers aren't really eager to detail what was in the boxes because they're jewelers and they're inherently kind of thinky yeah so like, and the thing is, like they could be avoiding like one of of three things, right or three of who knows. They're avoiding the revenuers, are avoiding paying taxes, they're avoiding the cops because some of it, yeah, And they're avoiding spouses because what happens. They want to be able to have well, and some of them have like some stuff that maybe they're giving to boyfriends exactly side pieces. And then also you just wanted you don't want your partner necessarily if you are a dirty jeweler, to know how dirty. So if they do ever like roll on you. They can't just go and get it all. You got to hide some instead of the thing. They'll roll on you if they if they want to protect their spouse from knowing too much, maybe they're not so suspicious criminal And I like that. That's really nice. I would have never thought they wanted to like, no, please give me plausible deniability exactly. Well, that's how I think these jewelers are like that. But they have like Okay, at first, the like initial estimate thrown out there was like three million pounds worth of stuff. Whoa right, that's a lot pounds sterling not wait what yeah, one of the biggest British Yeah, but that was wildly exaggerated. And when they had to actually go through and do the general tally, it was still fourteen million pounds A. Yeah. Well, because I'm sure that some of the some of the jewelers must have been like I had yeah, like, can you prove up to that? No, no, no, you have to trust me. He was there. I've got pictures. So it comes out to about fourteen million pounds in cash, jewelry, gold, valuables. Now what do you think. I don't know what the valuables were, But what would they candle laubras? What do they got up in there that would be valuable? I don't know. Gold crusted shoehorns, yes, you know, for slipping on your your shoes you're satin slippers. I honestly don't know what they I don't know when they say valuables, I'm thinking, like, what do they mean? Silver music stands? I get music boxes. They all get really melancholy and wistful when they open it up and they stare off into space and they do you remember, Amanda, Yeah, what do old British people want to play? Like? What are their chants? Like? What would they play? Do you remember any of the pub songs that they would be like bumping? It's like, oh, this reminds me of what I can remember when I when I lived in Scotland. Um, I would hear people singing a lot on their way home from the people saying in pots and stuff like if nine to five comes on the jukebox, people lose it. I love it the coolest. But I'll tell you what, I think that the biggest hit that I ever heard, um don't look back in anger by God? I heard that drunkenly catterwaled so many times I can hear the crousers now. So they have music boxes that played don't Look back in gold Encrusted. They've like repurposed Faberge eggs that when you open it, but it plays like it has like a little chip that plays the MIDI version of it. Yeah, that's that's basically what the value. Personally, I would have a fabric egg played wonder but that's just it's just you this there's a little song called wonder Wall. The cops, of course, getting back to the heist, the cops think it's a total inside job. Does it makes sense we would know all these three jewelers, I'm telling you the cops now, the cops. Now. The public really excited about this, and the public is like, you know what International Crime Keeper solved? Done international? And there were suggestions that it was work of the Balkans based Pink Panther gang. Oh they are awesome right so close it was the Great Panthers know only one color. The tabloids were kind of stoking the idea that there was an Ocean's eleven scenario. They figured that they most certainly used a contortionist at some point, A lot of them has to be. I've seen how how this plays out in the movies Pportionist. They need a Americans and movie star was always eating um, and they need possibly a bad British actor. Yes, all all of them. They I'm sure they had like composites drawn out and it was just the cast. It was just the like movie poster, not just Scott call and they arrested Scott can back point and he's like, I've been in l A this whole time. Um. There were a lot of people who thought it was like not the Pink Panther gang, but like an elite, elite correct team of thieves from either stern Europe or Israel. About this often they open throw that out there, like, oh, some some oligarch got robbed exactly exactly. That was a good theory. Well, so the world famous London Metropolitan Police Flying Squad was called in. I'm sorry that just always sounds like a money python bit, right. You know, they handle all the organized crime stuff, the big robberies. You know, we're going to meet him a lot in this podcast. We probably will. And the flying is because they're the catch all. They go everywhere, right, Yeah, they go everywhere. But also it's because they had cars I think before other units they like fly down the street running over pedestrians, so they're not like flying nuns, though they also had the power of flight themselves, as God granted them. Um, do you remember those two CCTV cameras at Basil, miss? How could I forget them? On those where a footage of a Mercedes E two hundred driving off as a white Mercedes with a black roof and like alloy rims fly flashy number, probably easy to pick up. Whose car do you think that was Governor's girlfriend? Kenny? Kenny Kenny? Because Kenny his own car and steal a car bro if, he like brought his car and parked it there and then they did their heist and he drove everyone home in the van and then he must have like ditched the van and caught a taxi. I'm like, yeah, just dropped me over by the by that Mercedes and he's like drifting off in the back of a cab. Um. You know he drove there and back in his own car because he's Kenny. Um. There's footage not only of the Mercedes, there's footage of Basil walking away from the scene with a large bag over his shoulder. I don't know if it had a huge dollar sign or like a bound sign on. It was wearing stripes in a burglars. He had the burglar mask on and he was tiptoe yeah and snickering. That was on the CCTV to it age. So the cops are like, all right, these guys, and they tail them for days. Um, they gather enough like so that they can bug the Mercedes, they bug another car. They're tailing these guys. They know exactly where they are. They film them going about their business, you know, popping out for points, strolls in the park, going to Sainsbury's and buying custard Sundry's I don't know, Uh, going to Greg's, the baker. Um that they're talking the entire time for more batteries for their hearing it exactly exactly every little counts, So they're talking the whole time. They won't shut up about this. Uh, they're bragging about how they did it to like anyone who will listen to the victory lap on now like this is if I did it. They're talking about what they took, how they're going to move this stuff. Who's gonna fence, like how what are they going to spend their money on? One? Guys like I'm going to put it towards my pension um. Basically, they just keep repeatedly incriminating them everyone. Here is my absolute favorite part. So they're speaking in like a thick Eastender London dialect, like their accent, and they're using Cockney rhyming slang. My god, I love Cockney rhyming slang. It is absolutely the best, and I think Richie does a pretty good job of getting it to the American audience. How how fun and how common it is. Like basically they're going out of their way to say more in order to convey less. So they're rhyming two word phrases, combinations or whatever to use you know, standard for something mundane. Like an example would be if I say apples and pears, I mean stairs because it rhyme. Yeah, so instead of saying I walked up the stairs, I walked up the apples and pears. What do you um? Or if you say barney rubble, it means trouble, trouble one yeah, Okay, let me give you a couple of these. You tell me if you know what they mean. Bees and honey, I'm going with money. Yes, lady, good diver over. I don't know a good diver. I got to think in an accent lady could diver? I can't think of it. Fiver forget that Irish pig a cop oh sorry, rhymrish pig, a jig, a wig like a chucky fright wig. Sweeney todd Um Hot bod close, that's like so eighties and anyone says like hot bod. I'm imagining like a lady in like one of those bathing suits from the eighties where the leg the leg hole goes with it like string tops. That's all sort of like lcro, like shimmery hot bod. I've been watching old Magna Pas lately and I have to say that some of those outfit combinations that women would wear in the eighties were like the neon or the neaprene, Like it's about the fabric and the color. And then I'm like, that's wild. And then all of a sudden TC comes by and he's got on pants so tight you would think he was pimping. And there's short short rightly manu p is like he was throwing out the bottom. Yes exactly. He had some plums. I didn't realize, like you know, watching them now is like a lot of my fashion choices came from this show, and I'm really questioning them. I like, how I'm convinced you were short shorts and you don't even short. I owned one pair of shorts and they aren't short shorts. Well, you know, maybe someone will break in and cut cut your pants. Yeah, we'll find out, you tell me. Anyway, Sweeney Todd does not mean hot bud okay, fair enough. It means flying squad. Oh right. I could have probably been to get pitched by the Sweeney Todd. So these danglings, one of them were an Irish pig to lift some tomfoolery at the school jewel. There you go, and you got pinched by the Sweeney Todd flying squads. So good, the hot bods flying spot. The cops had to translate the transcripts. This is what I love. So they're all talking in this like you know, gobblede cook. And then they have to write out the transcripts because you can't just go to court and me like, well, they said, they you know we're gonna wear a Irish pig. No, so it all has written out and it took them. It was a really difficult task to bring it from Cockney into the Queen's English. And there are people involved. There's a lawyer involved who compared it to work done by Shakespearean scholars. It was the time investment you had to have specialized. In the middle of all this rhyming slang, they mentioned someone named Basil and they're just like that is that? Yeah? And they're like, is this reference to Basil Towers from Alti Towers or Dazzle from gem and the Holograms? Was Gem in on? This is all of this animated and not real anything. They're really questioning their own existence at this point. So a month and a half after you know, all of this, may the police raid the homes and the known locations of the gang, and you know, they then also couldn't keep their traps shut and immediately start talking. Being under police, the cops hall of them in they're like, all right, I'll tell you everything. What do you want to know? So Danny, Kenny and Terry they're caught at Terry's daughter's house just you know, hanging out around a smelter in the dining room, melting down millions of dollars worth of precious metals in a dining room. They haven't on the table smoking. Chemicals are releasing, but you know you're just chilling, melting down, melting down gold. You have to repaint those walls. The governor has busted at home. He wasn't there. Um. They found lots of diamond related and eminating items though. At the governor's place, a diamond tester was that like a person from Calabasas, California. There's a little guy in a cage that they make him know it said, like, I don't know, you just test it. Like testing it's gonna be the hardness kid a diamond gauge, so you can get like the size of it. I suppose I don't. I know nothing about diamonds. Diamond magazines, Oh yes, of course, like Diamond Fancy, the sister publication of Cat Fancy Now, and then a book on diamond crime, like the Underworld of the Diamond Business. But here's another one of my favorite details. At Danny's house, Danny, they find a book that's called Forensics for Dummies, which I now, I really need a copy of Forensics for Dummies. I'm just gonna leave laying around, um, lying around, I should say, plus they found face masks, a drill in cash. But mainly it's the forensics for dummies. I love that there is a called forensics for dumn Like is that for dummy cops or for people who are like Danny trying to get over? Is it like for the slow criminal justice students there is? Or why not both? So in twenty September, the four original Gangsters um they admit to the charge of conspiracy to burgle, which is like, doesn't seem like a big charge for what they've done, but you know, I don't know what what it carries. I don't know either. So Danny says he wants to come clean. He's got his forensics for dummies. He's like, look, I just gotta be honest. I'm gonna tell you where I stashed the loot? Does he call it a boot the booty the give a hit. He takes him to Edmondson Cemetery and he's hidden like his little bag of getty's under a gravestone of a family member, you know, thinking like he shows them and he takes the cops and he's like, all right, here's my here's my cut of it. And the cops though, they had a question like why so you led us to this and you say this is everything you got, because like, did you know that a couple of days ago we found a huge bag of similar loot about sixty ft away from where we're standing now. So they had already tagged him going to the cemetery before, and they're like, well, let's check it out, and they find like the big bag with a dollar sign on it. Can you imagine his face when they told him that they found the rest of this, So he's like, I don't know anything about that, Okay, whatever. Danny Um. November, the cops finally identify Basil Michael Seed and then the next year, in March, Danny Kenny Teddy each sentence to seven years the governor Brian Reader. He is like, he's had two strokes, he's too sick to go to the hearing. He gets six years, three months, so they really didn't shave much off for leaving the scene and also for being ill um. Two years later, Teddy dies in prison at the age of sixty nine. Teddy or Terry Terry Teddy Perkins is the Atlanta creepy character. Yeah, that's what I was wondering, Yeah, it keeps sleeping into my consciousness. Terry Terry. There's too many, too many diminutive Teddy Terry Kenny Kenny the governor. He's released early obviously because of his poor health, and he only served half of his term to three years and change, as they say, March. So a couple of months later, the police finally find Basil's apartment and they rate it and they find just under about two hundred thousand American dollars worth. It's like dressing gowns. Uh. They find like two k gold gems jewelry from the robbery in his flat. Um. They also he has a bedroom workbench where he'd been melting down gold. They're all inhaling these fumes because they don't care piecing out the jewelry. Um. He said he had a jewelry business, but there was no this is my business. How's Danny Jones doing well? Augusten, He's sentenced to an additional six and a half years because he hadn't paid anything back yet six million pounds, so he just kept it and said I'll do the time. He's like, I'll get it to you later. And then they were like, where is it. Okay, you have to go back in take another six Kenny Collins, same thing. He doesn't pay it seven million pounds that he stole, so he gets another six and a half. So they get released after six years and have to go back and do another y. Yeah, well no it wasn't six full years after that, but it's you know, it's like half their time. They get it tacked on and so Basil he gets convicted of conspiracy to burgle and money laundering. Ten years for Basil, I don't know, God only anti fez hate. The governor didn't pay his money back either, but they didn't give him more time because his health was so bad, and they allowed him to stay at home in the shabby Sheek mansion instead of going back to finish his time. Most of this loot has never been recovered. Only okay, so I remember it was like a little It was a little over thirteen million pounds. Only four and a half million pounds has been accounted for. Nice, Yeah, they got away with that, but not well, he still got away with it. So what's your ridiculous takeaway here? My ridiculous takeaway is Basil should have been running the job. It seems like he really had it all together. The governor is a quitter. Kenny was a terrible choice, but Basil, I trust a man who sleeps in a face. Yeah right, um, I agree. In my my takeaway, keep your mouth shut, do a dime, keep your keep your mouth shut alright. So, uh that that's all I have for you to day. I like the Old Man Crime Gang. Yeah, it's good. It's good stuff, fun time, great panthers. You can find us online at Ridiculous Crime on both Twitter and Instagram. And if you have a tip for us about one that you'd like for us to discuss, or if you want to tell us about something bad you've done in your life it's ridiculous, you can email us at Ridiculous Crime at gmail dot com. I'm Szaren Burnett and I'm Elizabeth Dutton. Thank you so much for listening. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zaren Burnett, produced and edited by Diamond Dave Kosten. Research is by Marissa never Frown Brown. The theme song is by Thomas let Me See Lee and Travis Silly Button. Dutton Executive producers are Ben Likely Stolen Bolen and Noel Goose down Brown. Ridiculous Crime is a production of my heart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the ir heart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.