Thieves broke into the vault of a money storage facility in the San Fernando Valley, stealing around $30 million in one of the largest cash heists in the history of Los Angeles.
The crime reportedly took place on the night of Easter Sunday (March 31) when the burglars entered the GardaWorld money storage facility in Sylmar, LAPD revealed on Wednesday (April 3).
GardaWorld is “one of the largest privately owned integrated security and risk” companies internationally, and it partners with private companies, governments, humanitarian organizations, and multinationals, according to the company’s website.
The burglars were able to breach the building and the safe where the money was stored, according to L.A. Police Department Cmdr. Elaine Morales.
Nobody noticed the money was gone until the following day when employees opened the vault.
Burglars broke into the vault of a money storage facility on Easter Sunday and stole around $30 million in cash
Image credits: FOX 11 Los Angeles
The LAPD is currently working with the FBI on the case.
“It’s just mind-blowing that you would never suspect it,” he said. “$30 million in the Valley, gone. How? Why? I’m still trying to process it,” an employee who works at GardaWorld told ABC7.
“Was it an inside job? Was it just one person? Was it a group? You know, there’s a lot of questions.”
The burglars are thought to have broken through the roof of the facility, but a law enforcement source revealed that there was also an effort to breach the side of the building.
It remains unclear how they gained access to the vault without triggering the alarm system.
The theft is one of the largest cash heists in the history of Los Angeles
Image credits: Pexels/ Pixabay
A video shared by ABC shows a large cut on the side of the facility covered by a piece of plywood with rubble around it. It hasn’t been confirmed whether this was related to the break-in.
Scott Andrew Selby, co-author of “Flawless: Inside the Largest Diamond Heist in History,” told the L.A. Times that the crime has “all the markings of a really well-thought-out job” that was done by a “professional crew.”
Despite this, he believes the thieves might not ultimately get away with the sophisticated heist.
“As technology progresses and the world gets small, there are a lot of ways you can mess up and get caught,” Selby said.
“With touch DNA, the slightest mistake can expose the identity of a member of the crew, leading authorities to eventually identify their associates.”
Aerial footage shows a cut on the side of the facility, though it remains unclear how it was connected to the crime
Image credits: FOX 11 Los Angeles
Another mysterious aspect of the theft is that very few people reportedly knew that there were large sums of cash in that safe, according to law enforcement sources.
Anyone with information about the crime is being asked to contact the FBI at 1 800 CALL-FBI (225-5324) or online at tips.fbi.gov.
Bored Panda has contacted the Los Angeles Police Department for comment.
The burglars managed to avoid the facility’s alarm system
The previous biggest cash robbery in Los Angeles was the Dunbar Armored robbery in September 1997, in which six men stole $18.9 million from the former site of the Dunbar Armored building—a similar facility to GardaWorld— on Mateo Street.
The GardaWorld crime comes two years after thieves stole $100 million in jewels and valuables from a Brink’s big rig at a Southern California truck stop.
On that occasion, burglars used a 27-minute time window where one driver slept in the vehicle’s sleeper berth while another ate a meal at a truck stop. The criminal or criminals still haven’t been caught.
Multiple people believe the crime was an “inside job” carried out by someone familiar with the building
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