In the deportation fight that lasted more than two years, Pino won the final victory. Baker fled and the brief meeting adjourned. 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. Fat John and the business associate of the man arrested in Baltimore were located and interviewed on the morning of June 4, 1956. McGinnis, who had not been at the scene on the night of the robbery, received a life sentence on each of eight indictments that charged him with being an accessory before the fact in connection with the Brinks robbery. OKeefe was the principal witness to appear before the state grand jurors. He later was to be arrested as a member of the robbery gang. He was released in 2000, after serving 16 years of his term. It was given to him in a suitcase that was transferred to his car from an automobile occupied by McGinnis and Banfield. Information received from this individual linked nine well-known hoodlums with the crime. When questioned concerning his activities on the night of January 17, 1950, Richardson claimed that after unsuccessfully looking for work he had several drinks and then returned home. Again, he was determined to fight, using the argument that his conviction for the 1948 larceny offense was not a basis for deportation. Former inmates of penal institutions reported conversations they had overheard while incarcerated which concerned the robbing of Brinks. As the truck sped away with nine members of the gangand Costa departed in the stolen Ford sedanthe Brinks employees worked themselves free and reported the crime. When OKeefe admitted his part in the Brinks robbery to FBI agents in January 1956, he told of his high regard for Gusciora. Brian The Colonel Robinson, 78, was cheated out of his share of the record haul. For other similarly-named robberies in 1981, 1983 and 2008, see, "Historical Photos: Boston's Great Brinks Robbery", "A quarter-century laterBrink's robber admits guilt to Globe", "O'Keefe Says Brink's Holdup Gang Vowed To Kill Any Member Who Periled Others", "Specs O'Keefe, Informant In Brink's Robbery, Dies", "Tony Pino, 67, Participated In '50 Boston Brinks Holdup", "Adolph (Jazz) Maffie; Last Survivor of Brink's Gang", "Six Arrests Break $1,218,211 Brink's Robbery", "Brink Robbery History Recalled After Decade", "$1,500,000 HOLDUP: 7 Masked Men Rob Brink's, Boston; Leave Another Million", "The False-Face Bandits: Greed Wrecked the Brink's Case Gang", "Gang of Nine Robs Brink's at Boston; $150,000 Reward Out", Historical Photos: Boston's Great Brinks Robbery. This is good money, he said, but you cant pass it around here in Boston.. Police who arrived to investigate found a large amount of blood, a mans shattered wrist watch, and a .45 caliber pistol at the scene. This vehicle was traced through motor vehicle records to Pino. To muffle their footsteps, one of the gang wore crepe-soled shoes, and the others wore rubbers. Special agents subsequently interviewed Costa and his wife, Pino and his wife, the racketeer, and OKeefe. 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. If local hoodlums were involved, it was difficult to believe that McGinnis could be as ignorant of the crime as he claimed. Three and one-half hours later, the verdict had been reached. [18] The total amount stolen was $1,218,211 in cash and $1,557,183 in checks and other securities. Continuous investigation, however, had linked him with the gang. Investigation established that this gun, together with another rusty revolver, had been found on February 4, 1950, by a group of boys who were playing on a sand bar at the edge of the Mystic River in Somerville. He was not with the gang when the robbery took place. Banfield was already dead. During his brief stay in Boston, he was observed to contact other members of the robbery gang. Thieves stole more than $1.2 million in cash and another $1.5 million in checks and. 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. Apparently suspicious, OKeefe crouched low in the front seat of his car as the would-be assassins fired bullets that pierced the windshield. This article is about the 1950 robbery. 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. The thieves quickly bound the employees and began hauling away the loot. The FBI also succeeded in locating the carpenter who had remodeled the offices where the loot was hidden. This underworld character told the officers that he had found this money. There were recurring rumors that this hoodlum, Joseph Sylvester Banfield (pictured), had been right down there on the night of the crime. He was paroled in the fall of 1944 and remained on parole through March 1954 when misfortune befell him. During the trip from Roxbury, Pino distributed Navy-type peacoats and chauffeurs caps to the other seven men in the rear of the truck. Three of the newspapers used to wrap the bills were identified. Inside this container were packages of bills that had been wrapped in plastic and newspapers. 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. First, there was the money. 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. The $2.775 million ($31.3 million today) theft consisted of $1,218,211.29 in cash and $1,557,183.83 in checks, money orders, and other securities. Due to unsatisfactory conduct, drunkenness, refusal to seek employment, and association with known criminals, his parole was revoked, and he was returned to the Massachusetts State Prison. Released to McKean County, Pennsylvania, authorities early in January 1954 to stand trial for burglary, larceny, and receiving stolen goods, OKeefe also was confronted with a detainer filed by Massachusetts authorities. Of the hundreds of New England hoodlums contacted by FBI agents in the weeks immediately following the robbery, few were willing to be interviewed. Race tracks and gambling establishments also were covered in the hope of finding some of the loot in circulation. Among the early suspects was Anthony Pino, an alien who had been a principal suspect in numerous major robberies and burglaries in Massachusetts. O'Keefe received four years and was released in 1960. [13] Most of the cash stolen was in denominations of $1 to $20, which made it nearly impossible to trace the bills through serial numbers. On August 29, 1954, the officers suspicions were aroused by an automobile that circled the general vicinity of the abandoned car on five occasions. 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. WebLASD confirmed this was not a typical Brinks armored car seen in a city environment. Shakur's conviction includes planning the $1.6 million Brinks robbery in Rockland on Oct. 20, 1981. As a guard moved to intercept him, Burke started to run. Using the outside door key they had previously obtained, the men quickly entered and donned their masks. 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. Other members of the robbery gang also were having their troubles. 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. WebNext year January 2023 to be precise will mark 30 years since the Brink's depot in Rochester was looted for $7.4 million, then the fifth largest armored car company heist in As long as he was in prison, he could do no physical harm to his Boston criminal associates. The roofs of buildings on Prince and Snow Hill Streets soon were alive with inconspicuous activity as the gang looked for the most advantageous sites from which to observe what transpired inside Brinks offices. He arrived in Baltimore on the morning of June 3 and was picked up by the Baltimore Police Department that evening. After completing its hearings on January 9, 1953, the grand jury retired to weigh the evidence. Much of the money taken from the money changer appeared to have been stored a long time. He, too, had left his home shortly before 7:00 p.m. on the night of the robbery and met the Boston police officer soon thereafter. Veteran criminals throughout the United States found their activities during mid-January the subject of official inquiry. One Massachusetts racketeer, a man whose moral code mirrored his long years in the underworld, confided to the agents who were interviewing him, If I knew who pulled the job, I wouldnt be talking to you now because Id be too busy trying to figure a way to lay my hands on some of the loot.. Any doubts that the Brinks gang had that the FBI was on the right track in its investigation were allayed when the federal grand jury began hearings in Boston on November 25, 1952, concerning this crime. 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. All denied any knowledge of the alleged incident. In addition, McGinnis was named in two other complaints involving the receiving and concealing of the loot. A detailed search for additional weapons was made at the Mystic River. It appeared to him that he would spend his remaining days in prison while his co-conspirators would have many years to enjoy the luxuries of life. 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. Serious consideration originally had been given to robbing Brinks in 1947, when Brinks was located on Federal Street in Boston. From their prison cells, they carefully followed the legal maneuvers aimed at gaining them freedom. In pursuing the underworld rumors concerning the principal suspects in the Brinks case, the FBI succeeded in identifying more probable members of the gang. The detainer involved OKeefes violation of probation in connection with a conviction in 1945 for carrying concealed weapons. After surrendering himself in December 1953 in compliance with an Immigration and Naturalization Service order, he began an additional battle to win release from custody while his case was being argued. An automobile identified as the car used in the escape was located near a Boston hospital, and police officers concealed themselves in the area. WebWho Was Involved In The Brinks Robbery? WebThe Brinks Robbery The idea for the heist came from Joseph Big Joe McGinniss, but career criminal Anthony Fats Pino. WebAt 6.30 am on 26 November 1983, a South London gang of six armed robbers, headed by Brian Robinson and Mickey McAvoy, broke into the Brinks Mat warehouse at Heathrow Airport, expecting to make off with about 3 million in cash. WebBoudin plead guilty to murder and robbery for her role as a passenger in the getaway U-Haul van, where the $1.6 million taken from the Brinks armored truck outside the Five bullets which had missed their mark were found in a building nearby. During November and December 1949, the approach to the Brinks building and the flight over the getaway route were practiced to perfection. As this bag was being emptied later that evening, the glasses were discovered and destroyed by the gang. Burlap money bags recovered in a Boston junk yard from the robbery, Some of the recovered money from the robbery. This phase of the investigation was pursued exhaustively. Banfield, the driver, was alone in the front. The ninth man had long been a principal suspect. OKeefe immediately returned to Boston to await the results of the appeal. 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. It ultimately proved unproductive. As a protective measure, he was incarcerated in the Hampden County jail at Springfield, Massachusetts, rather than the Suffolk County jail in Boston. Nonetheless, the finding of the truck parts at Stoughton, Massachusetts, was to prove a valuable break in the investigation. OKeefe and Gusciora had been close friends for many years. All were paroled by 1971 except McGinnis, who died in prison. WebMore than 6,000 gold bars were stolen in the robbery from a warehouse on the outskirts of Heathrow on 26 November, 1983. Two other Baltimore police officers who were walking along the street nearby noted this maneuver. The robbers carefully planned routine inside Brinks was interrupted only when the attendant in the adjoining Brinks garage sounded the buzzer. Three years later, almost to the day, these ten men, together with another criminal, were to be indicted by a state grand jury in Boston for the Brinks robbery. Many problems and dangers were involved in such a robbery, and the plans never crystallized. In the late summer of 1944, he was released from the state prison and was taken into custody by Immigration authorities. Adolph Maffie was convicted and sentenced to nine months for income tax evasion. At the time of his arrest, there also was a charge of armed robbery outstanding against him in Massachusetts. Richardson had participated with Faherty in an armed robbery in February 1934. Instead, they said the trailer was targeted near Frazier Park in the mountains along I-5. During the period in which Pinos deportation troubles were mounting, OKeefe completed his sentence at Towanda, Pennsylvania. Investigation revealed that Geagan, a laborer, had not gone to work on January 17 or 18, 1950.). OKeefe paid his respects to other members of the Brinks gang in Boston on several occasions in the spring of 1954, and it was obvious to the agents handling the investigation that he was trying to solicit money. Following their arrests, a former bondsman in Boston made frequent trips to Towanda in an unsuccessful effort to secure their release on bail. 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. Had any particles of evidence been found in the loot which might directly show that they had handled it? Yet, when he was The mass of information gathered during the early weeks of the investigation was continuously sifted. Gordon John Parry, Brian Perry, Patrick Clark, Jean Savage and Anthony Black were all given between five and 10 years in prison for their part in the crime. That prison term, together with Pinos conviction in March 1928 for carnal abuse of a girl, provided the basis for the deportation action. 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.). Shortly after these two guns were found, one of them was placed in a trash barrel and was taken to the city dump. All of them wore Navy-type peacoats, gloves, and chauffeurs caps. During their forays inside the building, members of the gang took the lock cylinders from five doors, including the one opening onto Prince Street. Faherty and Richardson fled to avoid apprehension and subsequently were placed on the list of the FBIs Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list. When the pieces of the 1949 green Ford stake-body truck were found at the dump in Stoughton on March 4, 1950, additional emphasis was placed on the investigations concerning them. Well-meaning persons throughout the country began sending the FBI tips and theories which they hoped would assist in the investigation. WebRobbery Seven of the group went into the Brink's building: OKeefe, Gusciora, Baker, Maffie, Geagan, Faherty, and Richardson. Underworld sources described him as fully capable of planning and executing the Brinks robbery. Sentenced to serve from five to seven years for this offense, he was released from prison in September 1941. In September 1949, Pinos efforts to evade deportation met with success. He advised that he and his associate shared office space with an individual known to him only as Fat John. According to the Boston hoodlum, on the night of June 1, 1956, Fat John asked him to rip a panel from a section of the wall in the office, and when the panel was removed, Fat John reached into the opening and removed the cover from a metal container. (Geagan, who was on parole at the time, left the truck before it arrived at the home in Roxbury where the loot was unloaded. Adolph Maffie, who had been convicted of income tax violation in June 1954, was released from the Federal Corrections Institution at Danbury, Connecticut, on January 30, 1955. 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. OKeefe wore crepe-soled shoes to muffle his footsteps; the others wore rubbers. Except for $5,000 that he took before placing the loot in Maffies care, OKeefe angrily stated, he was never to see his share of the Brinks money again. Two days after Christmas of 1955, FBI agents paid another visit to OKeefe. This is not the first time that Cuomo has commuted a sentence for someone involved in the Brink's robbery. Before removing the remainder of the loot from the house on January 18, 1950, the gang members attempted to identify incriminating items. WebThe robberys mastermind was Anthony Fats Pino, a career criminal who recruited a group of 10 other men to stake out the depot for 18 months to figure out when it held the 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. At least four movies were based, or partially based, on the Great Brink's Robbery: Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}422202N 710327W / 42.3672N 71.0575W / 42.3672; -71.0575. As the robbers sped from the scene, a Brinks employee telephoned the Boston Police Department. The Captain Marvel mask used as a disguise in the robbery. Local officers searched their homes, but no evidence linking them with the truck or the robbery was found. Even in their jail cells, however, they showed no respect for law enforcement. FBI agents tried to talk to O'Keefe and Gusciora in prison but the two professed ignorance of the Brink's robbery. Two of the participants in the Brinks robbery lived in the Stoughton area. Since he claimed to have met no one and to have stopped nowhere during his walk, he actually could have been doing anything on the night of the crime. Gusciora also claimed to have been drinking that evening. [16] At 7:10 pm, they entered the building and tied up the five employees working in the vault area. Each of these leads was checked out. Many tips were received from anonymous persons. The truck that the robbers had used was found cut to pieces in Stoughton, Massachusetts, near O'Keefe's home. In addition to the general descriptions received from the Brinks employees, the investigators obtained several pieces of physical evidence. Soon after OKeefes return in March 1954, Baker and his wife left Boston on a vacation.. After these plans were reviewed and found to be unhelpful, OKeefe and Gusciora returned them in the same manner. 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. In the back were Pino, OKeefe, Baker, Faherty, Maffie, Gusciora, Michael Vincent Geagan (pictured), and Thomas Francis Richardson. After the truck parts were found, additional suspicion was attached to these men. A trial began on August 6, 1956. He was granted a full pardon by the acting governor of Massachusetts. He subsequently was convicted and executed.). They were held in lieu of bail which, for each man, amounted to more then $100,000. The month preceding January 17, 1950, witnessed approximately a half-dozen approaches to Brinks. 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. They spent about twenty minutes inside the vault, putting money into large canvas bags. Underworld figures in Boston have generally speculated that the racketeer was killed because of his association with OKeefe. From left, Sgt. The serial numbers of several of these bills were furnished to the FBI Office in Baltimore. The pair recruited criminal Kenneth Noye, an expert in his field, who While on bond he returned to Boston; on January 23, 1954, he appeared in the Boston Municipal Court on the probation violation charge. On the afternoon of August 28, 1954, Trigger Burke escaped from the Suffolk County jail in Boston, where he was being held on the gun-possession charge arising from the June 16 shooting of OKeefe. [14], Seven of the group went into the Brink's building: OKeefe, Gusciora, Baker, Maffie, Geagan, Faherty, and Richardson. Costa was associated with Pino in the operation of a motor terminal and a lottery in Boston. Some persons claimed to have seen him. The alibi was strong, but not conclusive. In addition, McGinnis received other sentences of two years, two and one-half to three years, and eight to ten years. Executive producers are Tommy Bulfin for the BBC; Neil Forsyth and Ben Farrell for Tannadice Pictures; and Kate Laffey and Claire Sowerby-Sheppard for VIS. OKeefe was sentenced on August 5, 1954, to serve 27 months in prison. 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. Charged with unlawful possession of liquor distillery equipment and violation of Internal Revenue laws, he had many headaches during the period in which OKeefe was giving so much trouble to the gang. The alibi, in fact, was almost too good. During the period immediately following the Brinks robbery, the heat was on OKeefe and Gusciora. [17] Approximately a million dollars in silver and coins was left behind by the robbers, as they were not prepared to carry it. Pino also Here, we look at the people involved and where they are now. He told the interviewing agents that he trusted Maffie so implicitly that he gave the money to him for safe keeping. Of the $4,822 found in the small-time criminals possession, FBI agents identified $4,635 as money taken by the Brinks robbers.

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