Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company Heist: 7 Sentences, Nothing Back

Summary: The Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company heist April 2-5, 2015, in London, England, got nothing back from seven charged, convicted, sentenced suspects.

(left) passageway drilled by April 2015 heisters through 19.68-inch- (50-centimeter-) thick walls of Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company; (right) sketch of defendants by courtroom artist Elizabeth Cook of Sky News, (front row left to right) Paul Rader, William Lincoln, John Collins, Brian Reader and Hugh Doyle; (back row left to right) Daniel Jones, Terry Perkins (obscured) and Carl Wood: Jess Bell @Jessbellnews, via Twitter Sep. 1, 2015

The Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company heist April 2, 2015, in London, England, United Kingdom, accomplished what it attempted to achieve because of adventitious fires and announced bank holidays and despite alarms.

The Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company break-in belongs among England's biggest burglaries and heists as a crime-based, high-valued intervention without coercive, fearful, forceful, intimidating face-to-face interactions. Its careful conduct considered all but one technological challenge that changed an otherwise cautious conception into a clandestine crime whose concealment collapsed not long after completion. Its discovery depended upon the end of bank holiday's deferring to Easter's and Passover's co-occurrence even though its description drew upon physical evidence and surveillance footage.

The Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company heist enabled its executors to extract £200 million ($296.6 million) in diamonds and valuables but exposed them on closed-circuit television.

Fires from faulty electrical cables flared for two days and focused London Fire Brigade and metropolitan police forces on nearby Kingsway from April 1 to 3.

The at-large ginger-haired burglar nicknamed Basil got in through the main door and got five others in through the fire escape door and the elevator shaft. They had a Hilti DD350 industrial power drill to hone a passageway through the 19.68-inch- (50-centimeter-) thick walls without heading into the vault door's security systems. No indications of forced entries through building doors and windows or through the vault door involved no intensive investigations into a late-night triggered alarm April 3.

Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company heist perpetrators jostled alarms once while jolting drills through walls and jumbling valuables into wheeled bins between April 2 and April 3.

Scotland Yard knew of the alarm April 3, the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company heist April 7 and CCTV footage before Daily Mirror releases April 10.

Metropolitan police let the online, print and televised news-following public look at crime-scene photographs of safe room interiors and walls laced with drill holes April 22. The investigations by the Flying Squad branch of the Specialist, Organised & Economic Crime Command within the Metropolitan Police Service made nine arrests by May 19. They netted Hugh Doyle, Jon Harbinson, William Lincoln and Carl Wood conspiracy charges November 2015 for committing burglary and for concealing, converting or transferring criminal property.

Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company heist trials offered Doyle a 21-month sentence and a two-year suspension for criminal property concealment, conversion and transfer and Harbinson acquittal.

The Woolwich Crown Court March 9, 2016, pronounced seven-year prison terms against John Collins, Daniel Jones and Terry Perkins for guilt in conspiring to commit burglary.

Guilt in conspiring to burgle and in burglary and criminal property concealment, conversion or transfer qualified Wood and Lincoln for respective six- and seven-year prison terms. Brian Reader rated previous police attention for laundering cash from the Brink's-Mat robbery Nov. 26, 1983, and, as Hatton heist ringleader, received a  six-year three-month sentence. Woolwich Crown Court confiscation rulings Jan. 30, 2018, stretched the Collins, Jones, Perkins and Reader sentences by another seven years unless they paid £27.5 million ($38,909,750).

Who took cash, diamonds and valuables from Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company heist perpetrators and turned Hatton Garden 88-90 to insolvency and liquidation Sept. 1, 2015?

After their May 2015 arrests in London (left to right) Brian Reader, Daniel Jones, Hugh Doyle, John “Kenny” Collins, Terry Perkins, Carl Wood and William Lincoln; photo-illustration by Sean McCabe: VANITY FAIR @VanityFair, via Twitter March 17, 2016;
(background) Hatton Garden’s underground safe deposit vault, by Carl Court/Hatton Garden Properties Ltd./Getty Images;
Doyle, Lincoln, Wood, from Metropolitan Police Service/AFP; Collins, Jones, Perkins and Reader, from Metropolitan Police/PA Wire/AP Images.
EASN Note: Terry Perkins, who suffered from diabetes and heart problems, passed away Monday, Feb. 5, 2018, while serving his sentence in HM Prison Belmarsh, Thamesmead, southeastern London.

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

(left) passageway drilled by April 2015 heisters through 19.68-inch- (50-centimeter-) thick walls of Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company; (right) sketch of defendants by courtroom artist Elizabeth Cook of Sky News, (front row left to right) Paul Rader, William Lincoln, John Collins, Brian Reader and Hugh Doyle; (back row left to right) Daniel Jones, Terry Perkins (obscured) and Carl Wood: Jess Bell @Jessbellnews, via Twitter Sep. 1, 2015, @ https://twitter.com/Jessbellnews/status/638747732983873536

After their May 2015 arrests in London (left to right) Brian Reader, Daniel Jones, Hugh Doyle, John “Kenny” Collins, Terry Perkins, Carl Wood and William Lincoln: photo-illustration by Sean McCabe: VANITY FAIR @VanityFair, via Twitter March 17, 2016, @ https://twitter.com/VanityFair/status/710436924884967426;
(background) Hatton Garden’s underground safe deposit vault, by Carl Court/Hatton Garden Properties Ltd./Getty Images; Doyle, Lincoln, Wood, from Metropolitan Police Service/AFP; Collins, Jones, Perkins and Reader, from Metropolitan Police/PA Wire/AP Images.
EASN Note: Terry Perkins, who suffered from diabetes and heart problems, passed away Monday, Feb. 5, 2018, while serving his sentence in HM Prison Belmarsh, Thamesmead, southeastern London.

For further information:

Blundy, Rachel. 8 April 2015. "Holborn Fire 'Could Have Been Deliberately Started by Burglars Responsible for Hatton Garden Jewel Raid.'" Evening Standard > News > Crime.
Available @ https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/holborn-fire-could-have-been-deliberately-started-by-burglars-responsible-for-hatton-garden-jewel-10163474.html

Clarkson, Wensley. 2016. Sexy Beasts: The Real Inside Story of the Hatton Garden Mob. London UK: Quercus.

Clarkson, Wensley. Sexy Beasts: The Real Inside Story of the Hatton Garden Mob. Narrated by the Author. London UK: Quercus.

Evans, Martin. 15 January 2016. "Inside the Hatton Garden Heist Vault." The Telegraph > News > UK News > Crime.
Available @ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/12102436/Inside-the-Hatton-Garden-heist-vault-360-photograph-shows-the-aftermath-of-Britains-biggest-burglary.html

Griffiths, Ben. 26 March 2017. "Where Is the Diamond Teaser?" The Sun > News.
Available @ https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3178437/we-reveal-theories-behind-basil-mysterious-final-member-of-14m-hatton-garden-jewellery-heist-gang/

Hartley-Parkinson, Richard. 1 April 2015. "Thousands Evacuated After Underground Fire in Central London." Metro > News > UK.
Available @ http://metro.co.uk/2015/04/01/more-than-2000-evacuated-after-underground-fire-in-central-london-5131022/

"Hatton Garden Gang Ringleaders Ordered to Pay £27.5M." BBC > News > UK > England > London.
Available @ http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-42880223

"Hatton Garden Robbery: Value of Goods Stolen Rises to £25M." BBC > News > UK > England > London > 31 January 2017.
Available @ http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-38806838

"Holborn Fire Shows How Complex London Can Be Says Capital's Fire Chief." London Fire Brigade News > Latest News Releases > 9 April 2015.
Available @ http://www.london-fire.gov.uk/news/LatestNewsReleases_holbornfireshowshowcomplex.asp#.WotdEKinGUl

Jess Bell ‏@Jessbellnews. 1 September 2015. "Hatton Garden safe deposit firm to close after £10million heist over Easter weekend." Twitter.
Available @ https://twitter.com/Jessbellnews/status/638747732983873536

Mann, Sebastian. 3 April 2015. "Holborn Fire: It's Finally Out! After Two Days, Underground Inferno Is Extinguished." Evening Standard > News > London.
Available @ https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/holborn-fire-dramatic-underground-blaze-fuelled-by-gas-leak-put-out-says-national-grid-10153936.html

Rayner, Gordon. 1 Sep 2015. "Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company Goes Into Liquidation After Jewellery Heist." The Telegraph > News > UK News > Crime.
Available @ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/11836386/Hatton-Garden-Safe-Deposit-company-goes-into-liquidation-after-jewellery-heist.html

VANITY FAIR @VanityFair. 17 March 2016. "Investigating the unorthodox daring of the Great Hatton Garden heist of 2015." Twitter.
Available @ https://twitter.com/VanityFair/status/710436924884967426