The Last Job: "The Bad Grandpas" and the Hatton Garden Heist

The Last Job:

Author: Dan Bilefsky

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Published: 2019-04-23

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0393609529

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The definitive account of one of the most brazen jewel heists in history. Over Easter weekend 2015, a motley crew of six English thieves, several in their sixties and seventies, couldn’t resist coming out of retirement for one last career-topping heist. Their target: the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit, in the heart of London’s medieval diamond district. “The Firm” included Brian Reader, ringleader and legend in his own mind; Terry Perkins, a tough-as-nails career criminal but also a frail diabetic; Danny Jones, a fitness freak, crime enthusiast, and fabulist; Carl Wood, an extra pair of hands, and definitely more brawn than brains; John “Kenny” Collins, getaway driver, prone to falling asleep on the job; and the mysterious Basil, a red-wigged associate who has only now been identified. Perhaps not the smoothest of criminals—one took a public bus to the scene of the crime; another read Forensics for Dummies in hopes he would learn how to avoid getting caught—they planned the job over fish and chips at their favorite pubs. They were cantankerous and coarse, dubbed the “Bad Grandpas” by British tabloids, and were often as likely to complain about one another as the current state of the country. Still, these analog thieves in a digital age managed to disable a high-security alarm system and drill through twenty inches of reinforced concrete, walking away with a stunning haul of at least $19 million in jewels, gold, diamonds, family heirlooms, and cash. Veteran reporter and former London correspondent for the New York Times Dan Bilefsky draws on unrivaled access to the leading officers on the case at the Flying Squad, the legendary Scotland Yard unit that hunted the gang, as well as notorious criminals from London’s shadowy underworld, to offer a gripping account of how these unassuming criminal masterminds nearly pulled off one of the great heists of the century.

Six Days in August: The Story of Stockholm Syndrome

Six Days in August: The Story of Stockholm Syndrome PDF

Author: David King

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Published: 2020-08-04

Total Pages: 322

ISBN-13: 0393635090

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A rollicking account of the bizarre hostage drama that gave rise to the term "Stockholm syndrome." On the morning of August 23, 1973, a man wearing a wig, makeup, and a pair of sunglasses walked into the main branch of Sveriges Kreditbank, a prominent bank in central Stockholm. He ripped out a submachine gun, fired it into the ceiling, and shouted, "The party starts!" This was the beginning of a six-day hostage crisis—and media circus—that would mesmerize the world, drawing into its grip everyone from Sweden’s most notorious outlaw to the prime minister himself. As policemen and reporters encircled the bank, the crime-in-progress turned into a high-stakes thriller broadcast on live television. Inside the building, meanwhile, complicated emotional relationships developed between captors and captives that would launch a remarkable new concept into the realm of psychology, hostage negotiation, and popular culture. Based on a wealth of previously unpublished sources, including rare film footage and unprecedented access to the main participants, Six Days in August captures the surreal events in their entirety, on an almost minute-by-minute basis. It is a rich human drama that blurs the lines between loyalty and betrayal, obedience and defiance, fear and attraction—and a groundbreaking work of nonfiction that forces us to consider "Stockholm syndrome" in an entirely new light.

Rogue Mobster

Rogue Mobster PDF

Author: Mark Silverman

Publisher:

Published: 2015-04-29

Total Pages: 406

ISBN-13: 9781511947626

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Mark Silverman grew up in the Boston underworld, under the tutelage of the Winter Hill Gang in Somerville, and the inner circle of the Boston faction of the Patriarca Mafia family. Rogue Mobster is a firsthand account of the violent Boston mob wars of the 1990s, when bodies were piling up across New England and Mark was walking a tightrope between Winter Hill and the Mafia. An amazing journey through the underworld of New England/Boston/Providence/Rhode Island/Massachusettes and the various crews of LCN & the Winter Hill Gang. Irish gangsters and Men of Respect operating in close proximity yet each respecting the other while everyone makes a dollar. This is not your, "run of the mill" tale or the same old story and names just re-arranged. "Rogue Mobster" tells the story of a young up and comer, with connections to the Irish Winter Hill Crew that can be compared to those that Henry Hill had in "Goodfellas". As a youth surrounded by top gangsters, both of Irish and Italian heritage, this half Sicilian, 1/4 Jewish and 1/4 Portugese, makes his way through the treacherous days of the New England Mafia wars; the young renegades who feel that the old regime's time has come and gone, and now want their turn running things as well as the diabolical two faced James "Whitey" Bulger and his Federal Bureau boys. Tumultous times to say the least, add into the mix the fact that the recognized leaders of LCN tap Mark to be their eyes and ears, due to his business proximity with the renegades and the fact that he himself is an up and comer, earning with both hands and enjoying himself along the way. As the saying goes, "keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer", this is a lesson that Mark always kept in mind, and it helped save him while out in the streets making a living. This is not your usual organized crime novel, it's material is refreshing and the facts/details he divulges are a change of pace from the average book. If you are a true crime fan, this is a must read, not much is published about the Winter Hill Gang so be ready for some new names and the 'usual' ones also.

Inside the Vault

Inside the Vault PDF

Author: Amil Dinsio

Publisher:

Published: 2013-11-06

Total Pages: 172

ISBN-13: 9781939758040

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Millions of dollars sat in a small, non-descript bank perched on a hill in the quiet town of Laguna Niguel in Orange County. But deep within its vaults was a secret: millions of dollars in illegally obtained funds belonging to none other than President Richard Nixon. Those stolen funds would not remain Nixon's for long. Over the weekend of March 24, 1972, a crew of bank burglars from Youngstown, Ohio orchestrated a burglary of the vault, which would eventually result in a score of over twelve million dollars - the biggest bank vault burglary in U.S. history. This book tells the remarkable true story of that burglary, written by the real-life mastermind who planned it: Amil Dinsio, one of the most successful and prolific bank robbers and burglars of the 1960s and 70s. Dinsio reveals not only the technical details on how the crime was committed, but also how the perfect burglary was undone by the FBI's dirty tricks.

American Sherlock

American Sherlock PDF

Author: Kate Winkler Dawson

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2020-02-11

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 0525539573

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From the acclaimed author of Death in the Air ("Not since Devil in the White City has a book told such a harrowing tale"--Douglas Preston) comes the riveting story of the birth of criminal investigation in the twentieth century. Berkeley, California, 1933. In a lab filled with curiosities--beakers, microscopes, Bunsen burners, and hundreds upon hundreds of books--sat an investigator who would go on to crack at least two thousand cases in his forty-year career. Known as the "American Sherlock Holmes," Edward Oscar Heinrich was one of America's greatest--and first--forensic scientists, with an uncanny knack for finding clues, establishing evidence, and deducing answers with a skill that seemed almost supernatural. Heinrich was one of the nation's first expert witnesses, working in a time when the turmoil of Prohibition led to sensationalized crime reporting and only a small, systematic study of evidence. However with his brilliance, and commanding presence in both the courtroom and at crime scenes, Heinrich spearheaded the invention of a myriad of new forensic tools that police still use today, including blood spatter analysis, ballistics, lie-detector tests, and the use of fingerprints as courtroom evidence. His work, though not without its serious--some would say fatal--flaws, changed the course of American criminal investigation. Based on years of research and thousands of never-before-published primary source materials, American Sherlock captures the life of the man who pioneered the science our legal system now relies upon--as well as the limits of those techniques and the very human experts who wield them.

How to Solve a Murder: True Stories from a Life in Forensic Medicine

How to Solve a Murder: True Stories from a Life in Forensic Medicine PDF

Author: Derek Tremain

Publisher: HarperCollins UK

Published: 2021-01-21

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 0008404895

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As gripping as it is gruesome, How to Solve a Murder is a fascinating insight into the career of a forensic scientist told by experts in the field. Includes a foreword from Dr Richard Shepherd, bestselling author of Unnatural Causes.

After the Oracle

After the Oracle PDF

Author: Shane Anderson

Publisher: Deep Vellum Publishing

Published: 2021-11-30

Total Pages: 231

ISBN-13: 1646051475

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In 2016, Shane Anderson made a vow to live according to the four core values of the Golden State Warriors to escape a decade of defeats—including divorce, debilitating spinal surgery and a suicide attempt. The basketball team’s values of joy, mindfulness, compassion, and competition became Anderson’s guiding principles, providing him a lens to investigate a myriad of social, personal, philosophical, and political issues, such as homelessness, the promises and failures of rave culture, and the limits of self-help. Part memoir, part essay, and part chronicle of the greatest five-year stretch of a team in NBA history, After the Oracle depicts the makes and misses of one expat trying to make a life worth living.

The Devil's Diary

The Devil's Diary PDF

Author: Robert K. Wittman

Publisher: HarperCollins

Published: 2016-03-29

Total Pages: 273

ISBN-13: 0062319035

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A groundbreaking World War II narrative wrapped in a riveting detective story, The Devil’s Diary investigates the disappearance of a private diary penned by one of Adolf Hitler’s top aides—Alfred Rosenberg, his “chief philosopher”—and mines its long-hidden pages to deliver a fresh, eye-opening account of the Nazi rise to power and the genesis of the Holocaust An influential figure in Adolf Hitler’s early inner circle from the start, Alfred Rosenberg made his name spreading toxic ideas about the Jews throughout Germany. By the dawn of the Third Reich, he had published a bestselling masterwork that was a touchstone of Nazi thinking. His diary was discovered hidden in a Bavarian castle at war’s end—five hundred pages providing a harrowing glimpse into the mind of a man whose ideas set the stage for the Holocaust. Prosecutors examined it during the Nuremberg war crimes trial, but after Rosenberg was convicted, sentenced, and executed, it mysteriously vanished. New York Times bestselling author Robert K. Wittman, who as an FBI agent and then a private consultant specialized in recovering artifacts of historic significance, first learned of the diary in 2001, when the chief archivist for the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum contacted him to say that someone was trying to sell it for upwards of a million dollars. The phone call sparked a decade-long hunt that took them on a twisting path involving a pair of octogenarian secretaries, an eccentric professor, and an opportunistic trash-picker. From the crusading Nuremberg prosecutor who smuggled the diary out of Germany to the man who finally turned it over, everyone had reasons for hiding the truth. Drawing on Rosenberg’s entries about his role in the seizure of priceless artwork and the brutal occupation of the Soviet Union, his conversations with Hitler and his endless rivalries with Göring, Goebbels, and Himmler, The Devil’s Diary offers vital historical insight of unprecedented scope and intimacy into the innermost workings of the Nazi regime—and into the psyche of the man whose radical vision mutated into the Final Solution.

The Grand Trunk Road

The Grand Trunk Road PDF

Author: Tim Smith

Publisher: Dewi Lewis Publishing

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 120

ISBN-13: 9781904587996

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The Grand Trunk Road is one of the oldest and longest highways in southern Asia. Through oral testimonies, photographs and texts, Tim Smith explores its history and shows how close links between Britain and places along the road continue to this day. The Grand Trunk Road was the main artery for conquest by the British Raj and passes through the ancestral homes of many British Asians. For the first time, the story of the profound impact of the British on this highway and its people is told in image and word.

Diamond Geezers

Diamond Geezers PDF

Author: Kris Hollington

Publisher:

Published: 2022-02-03

Total Pages: 210

ISBN-13: 9781839013799

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In November 2000, the most audacious crime ever attempted in Britain took place: the broad daylight theft of a diamond collection worth £350 million from the infamous Millennium Dome by a gang armed only with smoke bombs, stink bombs, a JCB, a speedboat and, bizarrely, a Catherine wheel firework. The Diamond Geezers, a motley crew of petty criminals from south-east London, were desperate for cash and had nothing to lose; the gems were in a poorly guarded tent by the river - how hard could it be? For the first time since that extraordinary day, author Kris Hollington lays bare the bones of the case, investigating the Diamond Geezers, the police, Dome workers and De Beers employees to get to the heart of the heist. Discover who was crazy enough to want to buy the hottest diamonds in the world, as well as the shocking secrets of the planet's most precious diamond collection. From the crime's conception and execution to the notorious trial and appeal, it's a gripping account of a remarkable true crime. Praise for Diamond Geezers: 'Sensational... Explosive...' - News of the World 'Kris Hollington has delved into the criminal underworld and spoken to sources from the police and De Beers to uncover a fascinating account of the event... a story of bungling ineptitude, audacity in the face of logic and disaster on a spectacular scale. A very British tragi-comedy... With echoes of the Ealing comedies and The Italian Job, it sounds like a box office hit' - This is London Kris Hollington is a bestselling author of over twenty books, several of which have been adapted for TV documentaries and dramas. On both sides, there was everything at stake. This is the unbelievable story of the Crime of the Millennium.