Monday 14 July 2014

Police swoop on suspects in international Belgian diamond heist gang

Police have carried out raids in three countries and arrested 33 people in connection with a spectacular £34 million diamond heist pulled off with clockwork precision on the runway of Brussels Airport.

The Brussels diamond heist was
The Helvetic Airways aircraft from which millions of dollars worth of diamonds were stolen on the tarmac of Brussels international airport Photo: AP

The trigger for the arrests was a man detained in France who is thought to have been a member of the eight man armed gang who snatched the diamond consignment from the hold of a passenger jet in a precision hold-up that lasted just three minutes three months ago.

Eight people were arrested in Switzerland, where the stolen diamonds were originally intended for and 24 suspects have been detained in Belgium as the authorities raided 40 addresses linked to known members of the Belgian underworld.

"We believe the man arrested in France is one of the authors of the robbery," said Jean-Marc Meilleur of the Brussels prosecutor's office.

"It's the only person that we can say at this stage they could have participated in the events on the tarmac. Among those arrested in Belgium, at least 10 are known to the court, including for armed attacks. They are part of the Brussels criminal underworld."

Suspects in France and Switzerland were detained on Tuesday night in the prelude to armed raids involving 250 Belgian police.

Police seized large sums of money, stolen diamonds and luxury cars from the suspects who are aged from 30 to 50 years old.

"In Switzerland, we have found diamonds that we can already say are coming from the heist, and in Belgium large amounts of money have been found. And the investigation is still ongoing," said Mr Meilleur.

A businessman and a Geneva lawyer among the eight Swiss people being held were facing charges of dealing in stolen goods and obstructing the course of justice.

"A big haul was seized, of 100,000 Swiss francs (£68,000) in cash and a large quantity of diamonds, the value of which is currently being estimated," said the Swiss prosecutor's office.

Prosecutors have yet to explain how the police got on the trail of the suspects or how many of the arrested men would be charged and arrested.

It is the first breakthrough in a robbery that was described by the authorities a "perfect" crime, a precision Hollywood-style heist during which no one was injured.

The raid at Brussels-Zaventem international airport was one of the biggest diamond robberies in history and it took the highly-trained professional gang three minutes to hold up a Swiss passenger jet before escaping into the night.

Belgian police were previously baffled by a robbery that took place with precision, military timing and apparent insider knowledge, allowing the gang to aim for the delivery of a diamond consignment within a 15-minute time window.

Wearing masks, hooded police anoraks and armed with machine guns equipped with laser sights, the robbers struck at 7.47pm local time on Monday 18 February, just before the aircraft they sought was cleared for take-off

The gang's target was a Brink's diamond and jewellery services truck that had just finished loading the 8.05pm Helvetic Airways flight LX789 bound for Zurich.

For security reasons, the valuable cargo is loaded on the runway just minutes before the plane takes off.

After cutting through a security perimeter fence near the Swiss Fokker 100 airliner, the robbers used two black vehicles, a Mercedes van and an Audi car both equipped with blue flashing police lights, to race across the airport tarmac.

Coming to a halt alongside the Brink's van and the passenger jet, four armed men left each vehicle and held up the aircraft's pilot, co-pilot and security guards.

The robbers then forced open its cargo bay doors and took out about 120 packages containing mostly diamonds, with an esteimated value of €40 million (£34m).

After loading the valuables, the eight men fled as security and police alarms were triggered.

The robbers drove at high speed through the same gap in the security cordon that they had opened in front of the aircraft on the runway. The raid took place without a shot being fired. The robbery was so fast that the passengers on board the plane "saw nothing".

The first that they knew of the attack was when their flight was cancelled minutes later.

One vehicle, the Mercedes van, was later recovered burnt out nearby. The Audi and the eight men have vanished, triggering a manhunt in Belgium and the Netherlands.

The diamonds had come from Antwerp, known as the world capital of diamond cutting, where $130 million in stones are traded every day.

Ten years ago Antwerp was the scene of an even larger diamond raid, when robbers took $100 million (£64 million) in gems and uncut stones.

Read more Europe news


More from the web


Back to top

© Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2014

Terms and Conditions

Today's News


Style Book

Weather Forecast