THE
ANTWERP DIAMOND CENTER was among the most secure buildings anywhere. With
hundreds of millions of dollars worth of diamonds coursing through its maze of
high-rise office blocks, it had to be.
Closed-circuit video cameras monitored twenty-four locations inside the
building around the clock. The vault, where hundreds of tenants stored an
incalculable amount of wealth, was two stories underground. It was sealed with
a double locked eighteen-inch-thick steel door that was armed with a magnetic
alarm — no one could get through it without a key that detached into two parts
and the code to a four-digit lock with 100 million possible combinations. Inside,
the safe room was protected with a motion detector, a heat sensor and a light
sensor. One hundred and eighty nine safe deposit boxes were secured with
double-locked doors that each required a key and a unique three-digit code to
open.
If this weren't enough, the building itself was located in the heart of the
Diamond District, Antwerp’s storied Diamond Square Mile through which $38
billion in rough and polished diamonds traded hands annually. The district was
wired with video surveillance that covered every inch of open ground, and it
was patrolled by a dedicated force of specialized, heavily-armed police.
Vehicle barriers prevented unauthorized cars from accessing its streets.
The possibility of theft at the Diamond Center, it was widely assumed, was out
of the question.
That assumption was wrong.
Around midnight on February 15, 2003, a team of skilled Italian thieves
subverted every one of the Diamond Center's defenses. They evaded the cameras,
penetrated the building, opened the vault door and avoided detection by the
safe room's web of electronic surveillance. They quickly and systematically
opened two-thirds of the safe deposit boxes and looted everything they
contained, more wealth than they could even carry. The men, members of a
notorious gang known as "The School of
Turin," made off with at least $128 million worth of diamonds,
gold, cash and jewels. Some estimates put the take closer to a half billion.
They did it all with stealth and smarts — no one was hurt or threatened during
the greatest successful diamond heist in human history. None of the loot was
ever recovered and the thieves would have faded into eternal anonymity.
