300 Million Yen Robbery

Fri 16 December 2011

300 Million Yen Robbery

Filed under: #satscene —— Sylvia @ 18:38

On the 10th of December in 1968, three hundred million yen were stolen from the Kokubunji branch of the Nihon Shintaku Ginko bank in what is the single largest heist in Japanese history. With inflation, that would be worth about 25 million British pounds or 38 million US dollars today.

That morning, four employees were transporting metal boxes full of yen out into the bank transport car. A man in uniform on a police motorcycle waved the car down and told them that their branch manager’s house had been blown up. The police, he told them, had received a warning that dynamite was planted in the transport car. The employees retreated as the man crawled under the car to locate the bomb. He swiftly rolled back out, surrounded by smoke and flames, and said that the bomb was about to explode. As the employees took cover, the man jumped into the car and drove away.

Just as the men were praising the bravery of the policeman, they realised his motorcycle was not, in fact, a police vehicle. They had been tricked.

The police released a list of suspects which included 110,000 names. Nine hundred million yen was spent on the investigation, yet the case remains unsolved. The statute of limitations on the crime passed in 1975 and it was hoped that that thief would step forward and tell the story. One reporter claimed he had traced a 500-yen-note and through it discovered the culprit, Yuji Ogata.

Ogata openly admitted that he and a cohort were able to sneak the money past police roadblocks using a light truck transporting glass panes. Soon afterward they fled to opposite ends of the archipelago.

But Focus (Jan. 27) responded by shooting numerous holes in Shukan Hoseki’s story, citing a lack of convincing evidence and attacking Ogata’s credibility. ‘He always has been a bit of a windbag,’ remarks the wife of his alleged cohort.

We will probably never know the mastermind who planned the perfect theft and got away with it. Maybe he is keeping quiet in case there’s a chance to plan another!

Meanwhile, on the 10th of December in 2011, the following masterminds perpetrated amazing and artistic photography upon Twitter. Take a look: