Biggest Cash Heist In US History: The Dunbar Armored Robbery | The FBI Files | Real Responders

There is a way to make an entry in my destiny now it was a conspiracy of witches download veli today in los angeles a gang of armed men invade an

armored

car company they seize millions and then disappear when the FBI finds suspects, insufficient evidence prevents They arrest their agents and The detectives try to penetrate the gunman's secret world to bring them to justice. An armed

robbery

is a terrifying experience as a gang descended on a Los Angeles

cash

vault and threatened to kill anyone who resisted the violent assault. It was the

biggest

heist

in American

history

and a piece. plastic was the only evidence i'm jim calstrom former head of the fbi's new york office the fbi lapd and the irs joined forces to unravel a complex web of money laundering fraud and a strict code of silence the warehouse district of the Angeles is a tough, shady part of town, street gangs and violence are common.

The area's businesses are housed in nondescript buildings, many of them surrounded by barbed wire fences. A secure block was occupied by a major

armored

car company on the night of Friday, September 13, 1997. Employees of the armored car company were As they went about their routine of counting and sorting more than 20 million dollars, the money would be distributed at ATMs throughout Los Angeles to meet weekend demand for

cash

. There were five employees, including two security guards, working the night shift at 12.30am. m., a guard took his break in the dining room as he did every night, but he was not alone five armed men subdued the guard in seconds, dragged their hostage to an office where the security monitors were located, then a second guard security who was preparing to return home for the night entered unarmed and without uniform did not offer resistance four of the attackers went to the cash vault the fifth pointed at the guards and monitored the security cameras the employees in the area preparing the vault they didn't know the building was under siege the gunman threatened to shoot someone they disobeyed orders or made sudden movements the thieves now had direct access to the vault and it's 20 million dollars a man seemed to be in charge barking orders to his accomplices No, no, don't touch that number five here, everything is according to schedule.

He also used a hidden radio earpiece to direct others somewhere outside the vault When ordering his men The leader used no names just a numbered code The thieves were coldly efficient with no wasted movement In less than 10 minutes they brought millions to the dock charge number six let's go upstairs we're ready in the outer office the gunman removed the surveillance recorder bolted to a desk seconds later the employees heard more destruction in the back office when the leader and another man returned the employees no doubt feared it was to eliminate witnesses but the assailants only stole the keys to the vault administrator's truck, suddenly there was silence, believing that the gunman had fled, the guards risked freeing themselves, they called 9-1-1, the officers of the Police were immediately sent to the scene, okay, wait, we'll go down there right there.

Now Detective John Licotta knew the case was unusual from the beginning, we have experienced armored car robberies where the couriers or the truck are attacked, but this was the first time we had a setup, the officers secured the crime scene and the Detectives began interviewing the employees. The employees said that the five attackers seemed to move through the facility as if they had been there before. They did not see them leave, but they heard the sound of a diesel engine entering and leaving the loading area. The sixth attacker must have have been driving. An employee thought she recognized that the voice of one of the gunmen was that of a former driver of the company's armored vehicles.

She agreed to go to the station in the morning to study a series of photographs of former employees. Detectives spoke with the vault manager whose personal vehicle, truck and keys had been stolen. They wondered why they took their keys and not the others. The manager said he parked in the same spot every night. None of the suspects asked him what the vehicle looked like, leading us to believe whoever took his keys. and had taken his vehicle he knew him and his vehicle the manager agreed the voice of one of the men was familiar but he couldn't think of a name he said he would contact him if he came up with it, the forensic technicians took impressions of the facility's door locks initially The damage found on the doors and lock suggested that the thieves used force to gain entry, but a subsequent examination by technicians at the police laboratory proved otherwise.

There was damage to the locks and mechanisms, but not to the extent that it would have caused them to malfunction to open. They believed the gunman had used a key and then falsified signs of forced entry. Company officials later estimated the loss at a staggering $18.9 million. The thieves knew what to take and what to leave. All tall cash containers, those containers containing large amounts of cash were taken, those containing no stamps or cash checks were not taken. This suggested that the robbers knew how the company stored its cash. The thieves also appeared to know where the company had installed its video surveillance recorders, including a backup machine that was hidden inside a locked cabinet in the administrative office, employees had heard the attackers destroy the lock to get to the video recorder. backup.

The recording devices were stored in a cabinet inaccessible to most employees. We interviewed every employee at the facility and 80 of them didn't know anything. recording devices in the administrative office investigators processed the loading area for any evidence of shoe prints, tire prints or clothing fibers, they did not find any, but they did discover what appeared to be a broken truck reflector or a lens cover. I personally spoke with the maintenance person who had cleaned the facility earlier that day and he assured me that that lens would have been left there at some point during the night, so we assumed it had probably been left by the suspect's vehicle.

We didn't have many clues as to what the vehicle might be other than a reflector that was recovered and we didn't know if it was a common item taken from trucks or vehicles since the money stolen from the facility was federally insured the FBI joined the investigation special agent John McCarron of the Los Angeles Field Office studied a crime scene video made by the Los Angeles Police that details the sequence of the gunman's activities during the they put them in the

robbery

room here this door is open they placed both victims on the ground here and also had their keys taken, once they did, the five gunmen had pulled off the largest cash robbery in United States

history

.

Officer McCarron hoped the public could help find them. The media received general descriptions of the individuals who committed the robbery in terms of height, weight, clothing, and size. fact that all of the individuals were armed and there was a reward at the time Assistant U.S. Attorney Alka Sager hoped that the vague descriptions would be enough to produce a lead, the victims told us that they believed the robbers were black and that that was based on the skin color they saw through the holes in the mask and they also told us that one of the robbers appeared to have lighter skin and may be Hispanic, they couldn't see anyone's face but they had heard voices at LAPD headquarters.

One of the employees of the armored car company was shown a series of photographs. The woman thought she recognized the voice of one of the thieves. She was now trying to match her voice to a face. The series consisted of photographs of police officers mixed with several former armored car drivers. and security officers chose a former driver as a possible match for the voice he heard the night of the robbery. Police learned that the man had recently left Los Angeles for New Orleans. Agents from the FBI's New Orleans field office approached the former driver of the armored car at his family home.

There's my partner. He said he didn't know the company had been robbed and that he was willing to cooperate. He said he had left his job in good terms a few weeks before the robbery my sister it turned out that he was out of town on vacation during the robbery and the agents were able to corroborate his statements about being out of town thank you very much the night of the robbery in los angeles the man was 1900 miles away in louisiana have a nice day thank you very much so he was ruled out as a suspect despite the false lead investigators still believe the robbery had been an inside job but whoever the gunmen were they left little behind and with 18.9 Millions of dollars in your hands could be anywhere in September 1997 the FBI and LAPD could not identify any of the six masked men who had robbed an armored vehicle company of almost 19 million dollars.

They believed at least one was a current or former employee, as the gang entered the building with a key and knew where the hidden surveillance equipment was. You mentioned at the scene in a second interview that the vault manager who was on duty during the

heist

real

ized that he recognized the main gunman's voice and they also let him go. He believed the man was Alan Pace, a former employee of the company. He thought Pace was one of The two armed men who stole the keys to his truck Pace were familiar with the truck and had asked to borrow it before you were the one who knew what kind of truck I drive.

FBI Special Agent John McCarron studied Pace's work history. Alan Pace was an employee who had worked for the company for approximately a year and a half; in fact, he was suspended the day before the robbery. Twenty-eight-year-old Alan Pace had no criminal record, but when the company suspended him for disciplinary reasons, he had failed to comply. in his keys investigators went to interview pace at his home in los angeles he learned about the robbery through the media but he assured the agents that he had nothing to do with the robbery he said he was at a party with his girlfriend the night of crime he gave them his address and phone number investigators needed to verify pace's alibi they called for a background check on the girlfriend detective john licotta discovered she was also a former employee mr. pace's girlfriends worked at the facility in the cash vault area and specifically had a position that required her to operate the security video equipment.

She had been fired approximately four weeks before the robbery. Investigators asked Pace's girlfriend about the night of the robbery. She confirmed that that night Pace and several of his friends attended an all-night party. In Long Beach, she and Pay remained at the party until the early morning hours of the next day and there were many witnesses who saw them there, although Pace's suspicious alibi was corroborated and was enough to stymie investigators temporarily. They would need a different tact to keep the case moving forward, yes, John John McCarty, here's how you're doing it. The only physical evidence was a broken amber lens found at the crime scene.

They believed it came from a diesel truck used as one of the getaway vehicles they needed to find the truck I purchased. With the help of some of my partners and a half dozen of us over the next five nights, between 11 p.m. and three or three in the morning, I went to the place where the armored vehicle facility was and interviewed anyone who frequented the area. on foot or in a vehicle a week after the robbery they patrolled the warehouse district near the crime scene after several nights they found a homeless man living on the streets of what's your area henry henry henry is this where you stay he said On the night the robbery took place, he saw a medium-sized rental truck stopped near the armored car company.

It seemed like he had noticed it that night because there was normally little business or nighttime traffic in the area, but he didn't see the driver. had never seen the truck there before nor since take care the description of the rental diesel truck fit the victim's statements that they heard a diesel truck in the company's loading area investigators suspected that the amber lens found in the area As he exited that truck, teams of agents and detectives searched facilities in the Los Angeles area that rented diesel trucks and showed employees a photograph of the lens.partial found at the crime scene.

Several recognized the lens as the type used in the running lights of a certain model of truck. The lenses were a problem because they frequently fell out and needed to be replaced. There were 83 rental truck facilities that rented the truck from which the lens likely came loose. We requested documents for all rental vehicles that had been rented two months before the theft for a period of time two months after the theft, investigators spent hours reviewing rental records, but there were no rentals by Alan Pace or his girlfriend , seemed like another dead end, authorities contacted Assistant U.S.

Attorney Alka Sagar for legal advice on how to proceed, you can't just get a warrant because someone is a suspect and you believe they committed a crime, you have to have proof of who committed the crime. Alan Pace had denied any involvement in the robbery and had even claimed that he was somewhere else. At that location he had an alibi that was corroborated by the witnesses we spoke to, so at that point all we had was the fact that he was a disgruntled employee who had been fired the day before the robbery and one of the employees believed that The thieves had a voice similar to his and that was clearly not enough evidence to know more.

The FBI and police began to observe the former employee of the armored car company. If Pace was involved in the multimillion-dollar robbery, he might show signs of the new discovery of him. wealth we did surveillance on Mr. As the months passed, there was little movement in the case. The reward for information leading to a conviction now amounts to 250,000, despite the extensive publicity that this case received in the media and the rewards for any information about the perpetrators of this robbery. There were absolutely no leads, no forensic evidence, no eyewitnesses, the investigation stopped completely, although Pace remained the main suspect.

Without more substantial evidence, the FBI was unable to make an arrest, for now it appeared that Alan Pace and five accomplices had gotten away with nearly $19 million in cash in September 1998. It had been a year since six gunmen masked men took almost 19 million dollars. million dollars the main suspect was alan pace a former employee of an armored car company suspended the day before the crime assistant federal prosecutor alka sager was frustrated by the lack of evidence against pace it didn't look like he was spending money it didn't seem like it that he had the fruits of the crime, so there was

real

ly no legal basis to go out and arrest him or even search his house, so the press coverage of the first anniversary of the crime generated a lead for case agent John. mccarron, an informant called the FBI saying he thought he knew one of the robbers.

Investigators went to the informant's home in the Los Angeles suburbs. The informant explained that he had been an employee of the armored car company a year earlier, at the time of the robbery. Since he left to become a real estate agent, he claimed that shortly after the robbery he was given one hundred thousand dollars in cash to buy a house for a man he knew. Eugene Hill Hill requested that the deed to the house be listed in his girlfriend's name. In his girlfriend's apartment in Hill, Hill kept a trunk full of smaller boxes. He gave one of the boxes to the informant.

It contained cash still packaged by the bank rappers totaling one hundred thousand dollars. The informant, when he received the money, noticed that the packages of ten thousand dollars had been stored in these bank straps. They were dated the two days before the robbery. We were later able to determine that the paper wrappers actually came from some of the money stolen from the armored car company. The informant said Hill changed his mind. and he asked for the money back, but in cashier's checks, not cash, the informant had kept fifteen thousand dollars and Hill had recently begun threatening him.

He hoped the FBI could protect him. Eugene Hill had no criminal record and had never worked at the armored car company, but rather in The background check revealed that Hill had a connection to the main suspect, Alan Pace. Both had worked for another security agency in Los Angeles. Investigators began monitoring Hill. At one point, they followed a business called Extreme Entertainment. The company advertised itself as an entertainment service offering everything from children's games to exotic dancers. Business records revealed that Eugene Hill was a partner in the company along with Alan Pac. Investigators suspected that Extreme Entertainment was likely established to launder money from the robbery was brought to the internal revenue service and provided information from records and documents that would help us prepare money laundering charges against some of these people the investigation team learned more about the company in addition to alan pace and eugene hill extreme entertainment named two other men as partners terry brown and fred mccrary all four had worked together at the same security agency before alan pace was hired at the armored vehicle company extreme entertainment's accounting books seemed suspicious to los angeles irs assistant special agent in charge philip mullins there were four alleged thieves involved in the extreme entertainment the extreme entertainment was not actually generating much income but there was a lot of cash passing through the business into the bank accounts and then a lot was paid money in salaries.

Investigators began delving into the financial background of the four partners. They subpoenaed bank statements, credit card reports and tax returns in Eugene Hill's personal banking records. They found that the suspect had a second source of income. One of the things we discovered were check deposits from a company called Rainforest. Now we never heard of Rainforest and didn't know what kind of company it was. So we went and looked at Rainforest Bank's records and discovered that in addition to issuing regular monthly checks to Eugene Hill Rainforest, it was also regularly issuing checks to someone named Thomas Johnson, like Hill.

Thomas Johnson's position in the rainforest was listed as consultant. It was unclear what type of consultants they were. Jungle was in business developing new recycling technologies. Johnson and Hill had invested two million dollars in the company. The investment in a legitimate company was a classic money laundering scheme. You take bad money. You invest in something. What you hide hides it and finally ends up with something that looks legitimate. Investigators were sure the five men were strong suspects, but so far no evidence directly connected them to the $18.9 million theft. Detective John Lacada and his partner, Detective John Wong, exchanged information. the suspect's names in the truck rental records from the time of the robbery detective wong made an important discovery my partner john wong, who found the rental contract of one of the suspects, eugene hill, in which he had rented the vehicle of the suspect that was used that night just before the robbery and then we came back right after the robbery, we were able to locate that same truck, it was still in the Los Angeles area, we got that truck, we removed the light assembly and we asked the forensic lab of the FBI to compare it with the lens that was found in the loading dock area they needed to know if the amber lens had fallen off that truck while waiting for the results from the laboratory investigators investigated the suspect further thomas johnson johnson lived in an expensive house In an upscale Las Vegas neighborhood the IRS conducted surveillance of his residence and during that period of time his girlfriend was identified at the time, agents flagged the girlfriend's name if Las Vegas police ran into her, they were to call Los Angeles on the night of September 10, 1999, almost two years to the day after the robbery, the team in Los Angeles. received a call and boarded a helicopter there had been a domestic disturbance at Thomas Johnson's home in Las Vegas Johnson's girlfriend had called the police they hoped to use the disturbance call as an opportunity to question the girlfriend, she alleged that Johnson had hit, she was more than willing to answer any questions they had about him.

She said Johnson was laundering money through Las Vegas casinos. He and a friend would buy thousands of dollars in chips that he would then have her exchange for cash. The exchange was always in amounts less than ten thousand. dollars to avoid completing cash reports. Thomas Johnson seemed to be very fond of gambling and seemed to have a lot of money to bet and it is a little complicated when doing this type of investigation because you don't know where that money is. coming from whether perhaps this is gambling winnings that are then used for more gambling activities or if perhaps it is what we thought was money from the robbery that the girlfriend told investigators that Johnson had mentioned a great job at the who had participated in Los Angeles.

She said Johnson had invested in a company with a gamer friend when investigators showed her a photo of Eugene Hill. She confirmed that she was Johnson's friend. Circumstantial evidence against Thomas Johnson, Alan Pace and Eugene Hill was mounting, but it was still not enough to make any arresting officers would have to pit the suspects against each other if there was to be any hope of a conviction, two years after six men masked gunmen robbed an armored car company of $18.9 million, the FBI, IRS and LAPD had gathered strong circumstantial evidence against five suspects, but nothing directly linking the men to the crime the only physical evidence recovered It was a broken amber lens found in the armored car company's cargo area.

Investigators believe the lens fell off a truck rented by suspect Eugene Hill the day before the robbery, sending the broken lens and the other running light lenses from the truck to the FBI laboratory in Washington, DC. Forensic metallurgist Michael Smith compared the marks on the broken lens with those on the other lenses in the truck. In this case, the marks look more like rings. on a tree and we tried to see if those marks line up or not using a high powered comparison microscope made an exact match the same tool had made all the lenses in the same work session indicating that the broken lens probably came from the truck rented by hill the forensic results were convincing but did not definitively prove that eugene hill or the other four suspects were with the truck during the robbery deputy prosecutor alca sega needed stronger evidence before authorizing the arrests and hoped that hill's girlfriends would not they would provide them.

She had identified two of his girlfriends who also appeared to be spending not large sums but amounts of cash approximately two years after the robbery. We had gotten to the point where we needed to talk to these women who were in Eugene Hill's life, worried that charges might be filed. filed a lawsuit against her, one of Hill's girlfriends told investigators what she knew. She told them that after the date of the robbery, Hill suddenly had a lot of cash. She said Hill kept two lockers filled with boxes of cash in her and a friend's apartment. she helped him count and classify thousands.

Hill told her that before they could spend the new Chris bills they had to look worn out, so she washed them. Usually Thomas Johnson participated in the operation. She said they would go to Las Vegas to buy gambling chips with the laundered bills. and then hand them over for new money his story corroborated the statement given earlier by Johnson's girlfriend in exchange for her testimony prosecutors agreed not to file charges against his next FBI agents and LAPD detectives wanted to speak to Eugene Hill's sister they had some questions about bank accounts the irs had discovered that we were able to subpoena her records and determine that she had several accounts that she held in trust for eugene hill. those records showed that there were many unexplained cash deposits in those records and it also appeared that checks were being sent. written for motorcycles, vehicles and other consumer goods, so now we had a little more indication that Eugene Hill was perhaps spending money that she couldn't really explain.

She agreed to talk to investigators but said she needed to make a phone call first. she walked away and seemed to send a numerical page. Investigators asked her about the accounts she had for herbrother. She was evasive and claimed to be unaware of any of her brother's financial affairs moments after the phone call. She arrived Eugene Hill when he was interrogated. Hill denied any knowledge. of the armored car company robbery, he told investigators that he did not have time to answer their questions at that time, but that he would meet them the next morning at his office loaded with cash. .

Hill was a significant flight risk, the FBI called Deputy Prosecutor Alka Sager for advice, I was getting ready for bed. The phone rang at home and the agent said. You know, this is what Mr. Hill wants to do if we let him go and it was just one of those split-second decisions that had to be made. I did and I made the decision that we were not going to let Eugene Hill go. We were going to arrest him that night. Hill was returning to his car. They arrested him with only circumstantial evidence connecting him to the robbery.

It was a risk. The law requires a speedy trial and the clock had begun to run out. On September 23, 1999, the FBI arrested Eugene Hill, one of five men suspected of having participated in a robbery of an armored vehicle company. Assistant U.S. Attorney Alka Sager had made the decision to arrest Hill despite having only circumstantial evidence linking him. to the crime, by letting hill go, there was a real danger that he would have alerted others to the investigation given the amount of money that was taken in this robbery, it was evident that these robbers would have the means to flee if they wanted to and I just felt We couldn't take that risk.

A search of Hill's home did not provide strong evidence linking Hill to the robbery, but investigators discovered accounting books that showed Hill had purchased real estate in other people's names. The main suspect, Alan Pace, was also listed in Hill's accounting books. such as having purchased real estate and other names, finally his agent philip mullins had something going, this was very significant and that there was over a million dollars worth of real estate purchased for alan pace that he had no legitimate source of income to purchase that property if Convict Eugene Hill faced up to 40 years in prison with the hope that the sentence would be considered.

He confessed and promised to tell the police everything he knew. He said Alan Pace recruited him and three other people for the robbery. Alan Pace told him that he had already spoken to Terry Brown and Freddie McGreary and they were ready to do the job and he wanted Eugene Hill to join and maybe bring in someone else, so Eugene Hill approached Thomas Johnson who agreed. participate and that's where the plan was hatched. Hill confirmed that Paces was the mastermind of the heist and gang leader Hill knew all of the men except the sixth, who was a personal friend of Paces.

Pace told the others that his plan could set them up for life. Allen Pace told them that they would do the robbery on Friday night when there would be very few employees working there, he said that he knew who those employees were, that they would not offer any resistance and that it would not be a problem, they would just tie up the employees, take the money and they would be In and out, you know, within half an hour following orders, Hill rented the diesel truck on the day of the robbery and encountered a gang at the party in Long Beach, shortly before midnight, they left the party one by one one.they drove to the warehouse district then five walked to the armored car company during the robbery one man stayed with the truck waiting a few blocks away for the call to stop when the truck arrived they loaded it rhythm they knew how to take the surveillance equipment He later transferred the money to a storage unit rented by Thomas Johnson where it remained for two weeks.

Four of them left in the rented van. Eugene Hill and Alan Pace left in the vault manager's truck, as Pace knew where he parked each night the six men dumped. guns and video recorders changed clothes and returned to the party as if nothing had happened in the time it took for the others at the party to drink a couple more beers. The gang had committed the largest armed robbery in American history. Investigators needed to corroborate Eugene Hill's story. FBI Special Agent John McCarron and his team believe Thomas Johnson should be next. Agents in our Las Vegas field office were conducting surveillance on Thomas Johnson and we knew his exact location.

We followed him from one of the casinos. Officers followed Johnson while he visited. Several casinos did not know if the suspect was armed to run a safe. Arresting officers needed to isolate Johnson outside and away from the casino crowd. They asked a casino security guard to approach him in a ruse. The guard told Johnson that his car had been hit and that he needed to get out to fill out a report, Johnson took the bait while checking his car, officers took him into custody safely, investigators laid out the case against him and the possibility of spend decades in prison, as if Eugene Hill Johnson cooperated in the hope of a lighter sentence Johnson verified Hill's version of the robbery and confirmed that Alan Pac was the leader investigators finally had enough evidence they quickly arrested everyone except the leader we knew that pace was aware of the previous arrests of the other individuals there was a warrant for his arrest and he contacted me here in my office and told me that he wanted to turn himself in on February 28, 2000 pace arrived at the federal building in the company of his attorney he made no statement and refused to cooperate with investigators pace was arrested and held without bail four of the robbers pleaded guilty to robbery and conspiracy eugene hill was sentenced to nine years in prison thomas johnson received 10 years fred mccrary received seven years and a half and terry brown received eight the sixth gunman eric boyd fought the charges against him and was convicted and sentenced to 17 years after a three week trial.

Alan Pace, who had orchestrated the armed robbery, was sentenced to 24 years in prison. Agents confiscated all of the criminals' assets and were able to account for around $5 million of the stolen money. so there is about 14 million dollars missing, we don't know where that money is, how it was spent, if it was spent, we just have no idea, but whenever the criminals are finally released, the FBI will be watching to see if they make any moves to If they recover hidden money, they will go directly to jail.