True Crime Campfire - Diamond Dogs: The Heist for the Millennium Jewels

Episode Date: November 10, 2023

For most of us, it’s kinda hard to grasp the life of a professional criminal. Only a tiny percentage of it is turf wars and whackin’ dudes. Most people who make a living from crime live just like the rest of us do: They go to the grocery store, they take their kids to school, they worry about money being tight. But, unlike most of us, when things get REALLY tight, there’s always the chance of a big, dangerous score that will change their lives forever. That is, if they don’t get caught. Join us for a story of ambitious greed on an epic scale, in which every single person involved--cops and criminals alike--is an absolute goober. Sources:Kriss Hollington, “Diamond Geezers”Kent Online: https://www.kentonline.co.uk/kent/news/the-old-style-kent-crooks-who-tried-to-raid-the-dome-236957/ https://www.kentonline.co.uk/dartford/news/millennium-dome-diamond-heist-raider-20222/Follow us, campers!Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfirehttps://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/Facebook: True Crime CampfireInstagram: https://gramha.net/profile/truecrimecampfire/19093397079Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfireEmail: [e-mail]! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com/Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.

Hello, campers, grab your marshmallows and gather around the true crime campfire. We're your camp counselors. I'm Katie. And I'm Whitney. And we're here to tell you a true story that is way stranger than fiction. We're roasting murderers and marshmallows around the true crime campfire. For most of us, it's kind of hard to grasp the life of a professional criminal. Only a tiny percentage of it is turf wars and wackand dudes. Most people who make a living from crime live just like the rest of us do. They go to the grocery store, they take their kids to school, they worry about money being tight. But unlike most of us, when things get

really tight, there's always the chance of a big dangerous score that will change their lives forever. That is, if they don't get caught. This is Diamond Dogs, the heist for the Millennium Jewels. So, campers, we're starting this one over a billion years ago and a hundred miles beneath the surface of the earth in what would one day be known as Central Africa. The colossal pressures and temperatures that far down forced some carbon among the liquid rock to bond together in a new, hard, crystalline form, aka a diamond. Some unfathomable amount of time later, an enormous volcanic eruption

carried the diamonds shooting to the surface, where it cooled rapidly along with the rest of the expelled rock. And now, we fast forward a long time to the spring of 1990, where the floodplains of Mbujimai in the middle of Zaire were known as a place to find some of the highest-quality diamonds on the planet. Thousands of prospectors worked the plains, from multinational corporations down to locals hoping to strike it rich. One pair of these local guys who made a meager living digging for tiny diamonds and dried up riverbeds suddenly stopped their work as the sun shone down on something bright buried in the dry soil. They scraped away the dirt, hardly daring to breathe as it became clear what they'd just found, an uncut diamond almost as big as their hands.

There was no sign of flaws or cracks. They wrapped the huge gemstone in a shirt and hurried back into town, seeking out the offices of De Beers, figuring that that massive company would be able to pay them the most for this gorgeous thing. De Beers bought the diamond for around $700,000, which was, A, a hell of a lot of money, and B, entirely ripping off the guys who'd found the thing. The uncut diamond weighed 777 carrots. It was worth at least a hundred times what De Beers paid for it. Pricks. Diamond dealers? Unethical? Say it ain't so.

They would never put their own greed over humanity. Right? Right, guys? I'm as shocked as you are, really. De Beers, how could you? How could you? They then spent three years and several million dollars cutting their new find into a 203-carat, top-color, flawless pear-cut stone,

one of the largest and most perfect diamonds ever seen. Mm, pretty. De Beers kept their mouths shut about their new stone. They didn't just collect diamonds for funsies. They were all about the money, monopolizing the diamond trade and hoarding up to $4 billion. Yeah, that's billion with a B, of the gemstones in their London headquarters to limit supply and keep prices high. Again, pricks. They wanted to sell a butt pile of diamonds and had a long history of successful marketing.

Diamonds became the standard-issue gemstone for engagement rings. in the 20th century almost entirely because of the Debeer's marketing department. Makes me love my sapphire even more. And they wanted to use their stunning new stone to get as much attention as possible to make as many people as possible diamond crazy. So they would unveil the diamond, which they had named the Millennium Star, at the UK's biggest millennium celebration at the end of 1999. As I'm sure everybody but our very youngest campers will remember,

the millennium was kind of a big deal, with huge celebrations. all over the world. In the UK, these would center on the Millennium Dome, essentially a huge exhibition center built on the Greenwich Peninsula in South London. Looks kind of like a UFO. Huge shallow dome with big support towers sticking out of it. It's genuinely massive, one of the largest buildings in the world, and a lesson that architecture on a monumental scale can still be kind of boring. Good to know, right? The Millennium Star was central to the celebrations at the dome and would stay on display once the building was open to the public. Just before midnight, with the queen watching the orchestral performance from the Royal Box, Royal Box, curtains fell on the main

stage, and the dome was shrouded in darkness. Then, as a choir sang, a laser shown through the Millennium Star, refracting into thousands of points of light. Soon after, a huge live image of Big Ben was projected and the old clock's bells chimed in the start of the 21st century as basically the whole country exploded with fireworks. Millions of people watched on TV. Millions of people saw De Beers's amazing new diamond and a few of them thought, I'm going to nick that. One of those dudes was Ray Bettson. Ray was born in 1961 and grew up on Walworth Road in South London, which for centuries had been one of the toughest and most dangerous parts of the city. His dad wasn't around, and his mom was sick a lot, so he spent a lot of time being passed around family and friends.

He was a bright kid, but he was dyslexic, and the London school system of the 60s and 70s tagged him as a dumb troublemaker and pretty much gave up on him. Generally, kids are fully aware when that happens, and they tend to act out. I'll show you a dumb troublemaker. Yeah, exactly. Ray started skipping school with other kids and committing low-end crimes like vandalism and shoplifting. When he was 14, he was arrested for the first time for theft, and he was well on his way to a career as a professional criminal, which, depending on the crimes, wasn't really that weird of a choice in that time and place. I mean, it wasn't something your school guidance counselor would suggest, but it probably wasn't going to stop you from getting invited to parties.

Some more experienced criminals took Ray under their wings and gave him some additional on how to have a successful life of crime. Never use violence, and don't try anything too flashy. Because if you gained any kind of fame, the cops wouldn't stop until they had you, and a judge would make an example out of you. So stick to low-profile crimes that would give you a steady stream of income. Ray had seen evidence of how dangerous a big score could be in 1983 when six robbers raided the Brinks Matt warehouse close to Heathrow Airport.

They'd been tipped off about a million pounds worth of Spanish, Pissetas, but then happened to cross three tons of gold bars. Today, that'd be worth over $200 million. Damn. Two South London lads who'd been part of the robbery, Mickey McAvoy and Brian Robinson, immediately left their tiny apartments and bought huge houses in the Kent countryside, paid for with cash. They each got a Doberman guard dog and named them Brinks and Matt. Well played, my dudes. super cute inside joke

so for obvious obvious reasons it didn't take long for the cops to crack this case dumb and dumber were arrested 10 days after the robbery 10 days 10 days that's all it took them I'm surprised it took them that long I assume it took them a few days to get the real estate sorted out

and then buy the dogs but by 9 In 1999, Ray Batson was 38. He had 18 convictions, all for nonviolent crimes, and he'd been in prison twice, 18 months each. He had a partner in two young kids and made a reasonable middle class income. Author Chris Hollington, whose book Diamond Geesers, was one of our main sources for this story, put Ray's income at about the same as a grocery store manager. Other than Ray's career, they had a normal life. Ray did tend to dodge family gatherings, though, because his partner's sister had gone and married a police officer.

Michael Waring. That'll make for some excruciating Sunday dinners. Damn. He had made some money via check fraud, but by now his main business was smuggling cigarettes and alcohol from Europe, avoiding the hefty British taxes. It was a solid scam. There was always going to be a market for cheap sickies and vino. And even if you were caught, you'd be more likely to catch a fine than prison time.

And at Christmas of 1996, Ray's smuggling business even helped ease the family tensions, when his cop-brother-in-law, Michael, asked if Ray could get him some cheap booze and a leather jacket for his wife. I leave the job at the office, Michael told him. Oh, how nice. But towards the end of the 90s, the government introduced new initiatives aimed directly at tobacco smuggling, hiring more customs officers and setting up more X-ray scanners. In late 1999 and early 2000, two of Ray's cigarette stockpiles were raised.

by authorities. Ray estimated his losses at about 16,000 pounds each time, but the press reported figures between 50 and 160,000 pounds. Choose your fighter, a habitual fraudster or the London tabloid papers. Neither one of them has a great record when it comes to, you know, the unvarnished truth. But regardless of the specific amount, Ray was suddenly in a lot of financial trouble. He had bills to pay, and he didn't have the capital to smuggle more goods in from Europe. He needed a lot of money and fast. Ray also had dreams. He was sick of the grime and grind of his life in South London. He wanted to be able to take his family away to a new life in Marbeia, the resort city on Spain's southern coast, a sunny paradise with a large enough expat community that you could

get British food in the supermarkets. Because why would you want delicious fresh-caught local seafood when you can heat up a frozen steak and kidney pie instead, right? Good God. There are a couple different stories on what happened next. Ray's version is that his cop brother-in-law, Michael Wearing, had a word with him while they were walking in the park with their kids. I've got something that might interest you, Michael said. I'm working at the dome as part of the perimeter security. Michael had been a successful police officer and had once been decorated for tackling somebody with a knife while he was off duty. He'd been promoted to detective. And then, for reasons which are unclear, demoted back to beat cop again. Yes, some shit.

happened there. Like, we don't know what, but something, because they don't just do that. According to Ray, Michael was disillusioned with his police career and thinking of getting out. He had an old school friend, Tony, who'd just been fired from Group 4, the private company that handled security for the dome. Both of them agreed that security at the dome, including that part protecting the priceless gems in the De Beers exhibit, was a joke. Police officers patrolled the outside, but had to get approval from senior officers to go in. It's just crazy to me. Inside, group four wouldn't actually tackle any miscreants themselves. They'd just report the trouble and wait for the police. Group four had even pulled

their dedicated guard from the De Beers exhibit. The tour guide who answered the visitors' questions would now be responsible for reporting any trouble. But they hadn't bothered to tell the tour guides about the change. The whole situation was a mess. The millennium jewels were ripe for the taking. Now, Michael Waring, the cop brother-in-law, denies having any part whatsoever in any of Ray's criminal schemes down to asking him for cheap booze in the leather jacket, and a judge would later point out that there was zero evidence of any wrongdoing on his part. He was a recently demoted police officer working perimeter security for the dome, with a close, familiar relation to one of the primary instigators of a heist, so I assume investigators took a good look at him,

but they either didn't find anything or chose not to use what they found. But somehow or other anyway, Ray was introduced to a guy named Tony, who's kind of a shadowy figure throughout this whole thing. Ray met up with him in a South London pie and mash shop to hear about the vulnerabilities of the Millennium Dome. He learned that Tony already had a buyer set up for the Millennium Star Diamond, someone who was willing to pay half a million pounds for it. It was a big score,

and exactly the kind of high-profile job Ray had been warned against his entire life. But he was desperate, and he bit. Dumbass. His criminal career hadn't included anything remotely resembling a heist, so Ray got in touch with a guy who had experience in the field, an old pro called Terry Millman. Terry was tall and thin and pushing 60, his face creased with laugh lines.

He was well-known and very well-liked in South London criminal circles, always smiling, always up for a laugh. He could also be terrifying. Unlike Ray, he'd never had a problem using violence as part of his crimes, and he'd done a 14-year stretch for armed robbery. Terry jumped at the chance to go for the Millennium Star, but his motives weren't quite the same as everybody else who'd be involved. Yeah, it wasn't just the money for him.

Terry had terminal stomach cancer, and he'd chosen to not have it treated. We don't know why. I mean, sometimes people do this. they'll see a loved one go through chemo and all the rest and just decide they'd rather deal with the disease. Not something I'd recommend doing, but there it is. Terry was in near constant pain, which he mainly handled by drinking, and he knew he didn't have long to live. He wanted to make one last massive score, something big enough that he'd go down in history, at least among his

criminal buddies. The mysterious Tony was the man with the plan. Literally. He supplied blueprints of the dome and the vault that held the diamonds. There was a gap in the fence around the dome with vehicle access blocked by a concrete pole. To get through this, the crew would drive a JCB bulldozer smashing down the pole and driving straight into the structure. There was plenty of construction work around the dome, so the bulldozer probably wouldn't attract any attention until it started smashing through things. Anticipating a slow response from confused dome security about four or five minutes, the thieves would have time to grab the gems and drive to a beach on the Thames just north of the dome, beside a sculpture called a slice of reality.

This artwork is a 25-foot wide cross-section of a ship, fixed to the muddy floor of the Thames. It's hard to miss as far as landmarks go, and a boat would be waiting for the thieves there to speed them over to the opposite shore to make their escape. All pretty wild and daring stuff, but Ray and Terry thought the plan had a decent chance of success. Yeah, it's going to go great. They needed more bodies, though. Ray's first recruit was an old friend of his from Walworth Road, Bill Cochrom, a big guy with a record of petty, nonviolent crimes.

Various associates described him as a pussycat and a teddy bear. He was deeply loyal to his friends and said yes as soon as Ray asked him. Bill was in the building trade, and it was his job to figure out how to get the Millennium Jules out of their protective glass case. De Beers had proclaimed their display case to be unbreakable. But after a couple of visits to the dome to tap on the glass, Bill was pretty sure brute force would do the trick. I mean, Titanic, meet iceberg, right? Right. That's exactly what it is. Hubris to be yours, hubris.

Hubris. A few shots from a nail gun to weaken the glass and then smash it open with a sledgehammer. The fourth and youngest member of the gang was 29-year-old Aldo Sia Rochi, who had an Italian father but had grown up on a South London Council estate. and had known Ray Betzen and Bill Crockram for most of his life. He dated Bill's daughter for a few years and bonded with Bill after the girl broke up with him. Kind of a weird way to make a friend, but whatever. It really, it was like, and I swear to God, this is what happened. So he's dating the guy's daughter.

They break up, and then he goes to Bill like, your daughter, right? Like, I mean, and Bill's like, right? She's crazy. And that's like how they bonded. It's so weird. Dad of the year. Dad of the year. As you've probably noticed, neither Ray Bettson or Bill Crockram

were exactly scarfaced when it came to looming large in the underworld. But Aldo Siorochi really put the petty into petty crime. He'd had one brief incarceration for shoplifting right after high school, and that was pretty much it. But Ray and Bill trusted him, so they asked if he wanted in on the Millennium Dome job. Man, that's a crack team. already, ain't it? Oceans 11. Yeah. Aldo was mostly going straight with a property company that was doing all right but not spectacular. And in 1998, he'd gotten together with Elizabeth Kirsch,

a young American student who'd taken six months out from her English lit degree to do some modeling in Paris and London, which sounds exactly like the wish a lot of girls would make if they rubbed a lamp and a genie popped out. But Elizabeth had actually been really lonely in Paris and London wasn't much better. So when a friend gave her the number of this guy she knew called Aldo, Elizabeth called him. They hit it off on the phone and met in person a couple days later, Aldo showing up dressed in all black, wearing shades, and driving a fancy sob convertible. Probably helps to be at least part Italian to pull that off without looking ridiculous. They hit it off again, and Aldo helped Elizabeth move into her new flat. There was obviously

something cooking between the two of them, but Aldo tried to play things cool. telling Elizabeth he wanted to keep it cash. He had four other girlfriends, you know. This was a lie. He had no other girlfriends. He'd fallen for Elizabeth pretty much at first sight, and now he was trying to look like a playa. The sob was a rental he couldn't afford. Same for his fancy Dockland's flat. His business was in trouble, and he was living beyond his means, which would only get worse as he tried to impress this new girlfriend that he felt was out of his league. And given her bio, you can see why he'd think she was a fancy type who he had to pamper. She wasn't, actually. She was a middle-class American girl who just happened to be

5-11 with legs up to her eyeballs, but Aldo felt like he had to keep laying it on thick. Elizabeth graduated from NYU in 1999 and came straight back to London to live with Aldo. In early 2000, his property business flamed out, and he couldn't get anything else going. He was already in debt, and on top of all the worries that situation would cause anybody, he'd convinced himself that he'd lose Elizabeth if he couldn't keep up his fake, roller lifestyle, which was just his own insecurity talking. Dude, she came to a different continent for you. She's all in. Calm down. So now Aldo had a choice. Come clean with his lady love that he was in deep financial shit and they were going to have to do some serious downsizing or splash out

on a ridiculously expensive Cartier watch for her and sign up for a diamond heist that he was woefully, pitifully unqualified to be any part of. Aldo, of course, chose. door number two. Their plan to go on a clearer shape as they discussed the details. The bulldozer would be modified so Aldo and Bill Cochram could be passengers alongside Ray who'd be driving it. They'd start their raid at 9.30 a.m., which was in the dome and the De Beers vault open to the public, but the vault was far enough from the entrance that there shouldn't be anybody there when the bulldozer came through. The three of them would have gas masks. When they were outside the Vault, Aldo would jump down and let off some smoke bombs to create general confusion and provide

some cover from the security cameras. That's my favorite part. Smoke bombs like supervillains. Anybody else just do a face palm? Yeah, me too. Bill and Ray would rush into the vault and use the nail gun and sledgehammer to smash open the protective glass case, then some heavy-duty bolt cutters to cut the metal stand holding the diamonds. They'd spray down the area with Vicks nasal spray bottles filled with ammonia to ruin any potential DNA evidence, then all three of them would jump back in the dozer and speed to the Thames, where a boat would be waiting for their escape. Ray had decided that Terry Millman, because of both his debilitating illness and his propensity for violence, wouldn't be part of the business end of the heist, but would handle the

escape. They'd cross the river, jump in a recently stolen van, then drive through the Limehouse-link tunnel back to South London, and be at the Mayflower Pub by 10.15 a.m., where their buyer would be waiting. They'd exchange the diamonds for cash and split up, half a million pounds richer for less than an hour's work, if everything went right. This sounds like the kind of plan you come up with when you think that the people you're stealing from have never had a singular thought in their heads. Like this, This sounds like a heist that they came up with during a Dungeons and Dragons game, and the DM is about to, like, lay the smackdown on them, okay?

Yeah, absolutely. One of the reasons Ray Batson had brought in Terry Millman was for his underworld connections, and these included a fella by the name of James Wenham, who lived in a place called Tong Farm down in the Kent countryside. Holy shit, that is a string of whimsical names. James Wenham at Tong Farm. in the Kent countryside. The UK has aggressive whimsy.

I've always said it. My God, it's aggressively whimsical. Yeah. That was a recent move. Wenham had bought the place in March 2000, paying with cash. The Wenim's were a notorious criminal family, suspected of involvement in drug smuggling, money laundering, and large-scale car theft.

James' son, Lee, was a good mechanic, and he agreed to modify the gang's bulldozer so it would go faster and be able to kill. passengers. Millman had also arranged for the bulldozer, speedboat, and stolen getaway van to be stored at Tong Farm until right before the heist. In July of 2000, Ray and Terry drove down to Tong Farm to meet with the Wenims, and that was where everything started to go tits up. One of the problems you run into when working with career criminals is that they, I don't know, commit crimes. The day before Ray went down to Tong Farm, Terry Millman and Lee Wenham had been part of a crew that had tried to rob an armored car.

They'd forced it to stop by swerving in front of it with a van, then having one nimble dude slide under and snip the brake lines, which stopped the armored car from being able to reverse. A semi-truck parked down the street started reversing straight toward the armored car at a high speed. It had been modified with a big concrete-filled metal spike on the back of it, designed to, to punch a hole through the armored rear doors of the security van. Then, they'd shove in an anchor that the semi would use to yank the doors off the armored car. Wow. Yeah. Yep.

Two smashing impacts weren't enough to make an anchor-sized hole, though. And before they could try a third time, the cop showed up a lot quicker than the robbers had anticipated. They fled, jumping onto a waiting speedboat on the nearby Medway River. Like, is all of England just participating in a Bond film? Where are all these speedboats coming from? I know. It's like very Miami Vice. This failed but daring attempted robbery was an almost exact duplicate of another failure

tried out in February in the Nine Elms area of London. That one had failed because the semi had double parked in front of a car and the owner had been so pissed off at being blocked in that he'd reached inside of the truck and taken the keys out of the ignition. Yeah. Yeah. Halfway through their heist, the crew had discovered they had no way of starting the truck and had fled. I love this.

Thwarted by Petty Road rage. Honestly, I get it. I'm on the eye, like, have you not ever just wanted to like take someone's keys away forcefully? Like, what the fuck are you driving for? Oh. Oh, so good. A senior detective who responded to the most recent attempted robbery

recognized the van used to block off the armored car. The cops had seen it before, at Tong Farm, which the local PD had been keeping a close eye on. Cops tend to do that when a notorious crime family moves to town. So, with two failed robbery attempts, the police were sure a third attempt was on the way. Tong Farm was surveyed by a team of six specialist detectives. And the surveillance just happened to start on the same day that Ray Bettson, completely in the dark about both attempted robberies,

drove down to the farm for the first time. As he got out of the car and shook Terry Millman's hand, a cop took his picture with a telephoto lens. Doe! The police initially had no idea who Ray was and made an understandable mistake. They assumed he must be part of the crew who tried both armored car robberies

here to discuss the next big job. So they put Ray under constant surveillance. As the days passed, police watched Ray and Bill Cockram test drive a speedboat, take their kids to visit the Millennium Dome, with Ray and Bill spending most of their time in the money zone, specifically the De Beers exhibit. Police watched them stare at the diamonds, Bill leaning forward to tap on the security glass. Then they videotaped quick exit routes from the dome, unaware that they themselves were being taped by the Kent police. The detectives watching Ray Bettson could hardly believe what they were seeing. These guys, surely

weren't going to try and knock over the dome, were they? They couldn't be going after the Millennium Jules, surely. Right? The Kent police passed on their suspicions to London's Flying Squad, which initially had been an armed fast response team covering all of London's districts and now handled most of the Capitol's armed robbery and organized crime investigations. And it seems like the Flying Squad were just absolutely delighted to hear about the dome job, because, see, they really needed a big win right about them. One of the main reasons detectives are recruited into the Flying Squad is for their underworld contacts.

Around 40% of the unit's cases are solved with the help of confidential informants, a staggeringly high number. For other departments, the numbers around 5%. The Flying Squad relies on close relationships with criminals for its success, but as Nietzsche sort of said one time if you gaze into some bloke down the pub selling dodgy Belgian VCRs he gazes also into you or something like that

I apologize for that terrible butchering of British accent a close relationship with criminals you know it's a two-way street there's a lot of opportunities to make some quick money and the Flying Squad had a list of corruption scandals almost as long as its list of criminal takedowns criminals were tipped off about investigations in exchange for cash officers helped with drug dealing and sometimes when robbers were apprehended the cops would help themselves to some of their take bribery was everywhere and if you had a tough case why go to all the trouble of solving it when you could just plant evidence on some poor bastard knock off early good god gross an investigation in 1997 accused 49 officers of the 125 in the fly squad of being corrupt. That's 40% of them. So by the time Ray and his buds were planning the

Millennium Star The Flying Squad's reputation was almost as low as it had ever been. The lowest point had probably been in 1977 when their former head, Ken Drury, was jailed for his part in running London's biggest porn syndicates. I know, it's so good. he was a he was a he was a he was a titty's mafioso um i think i think that might be the funniest kind of corruption to be arrested for like imagine you get to prison and they're all sizing you up and all these dudes like they look they look you up and down they go what are you in for and you go oh i was moving product and they're like oh drugs and you have to go like no playboys and softcore videos like

for new fish. Oh, is a Titty Kingpin. Titty Kingpin. You know what? That's honestly, I think that's a little anti-feminist of us. We should say, he could have been slinging balls. It could have been a Wang Kingpin. Yeah, wang a kingpin. Yes. God. He could have been a men king pin. All right. Absolutely. Wow. So, yeah, the Flying Squad needed a big win right about now, needed it bad enough that they were perfectly willing to overhype the dome caper the Kent police had handed them. And when I say overhype, oh my God, I mean overhype. Over 300 officers would be involved in what the flying squad called Operation Magician.

A hundred from the squad itself, plus firearms and intelligence officers from other units. John Shatford, best last name ever. John Shatford, the head of the operation, described the crew planning the heist to his superiors as serious armed robbers, saying that other criminals walked in fear of them. These goobs, like the dudes we've been talking about. They had, he claimed, netted 15 million pounds from armed robberies, all of which would have been news to Ray Betson, Bill Cockram, and Aldo Sorocci, none of whom had ever committed a violent crime, had no part in armed. robberies and had never been close to a million pounds in their lives. And obviously, we're not saying these guys were angels. They clearly were not. But I think we can accept both that they were criminals who should probably be arrested and also that the police

reaction was beyond absurd. You got three doofuses on one side and on the other you've got the London cops freaking repelling in like all black outfits, dodging laser sights like Catherine Zeta Jones. Like everybody involved here is in a fantasy world. The crooks, or fantasizing about the big score, and the cops are like, you know, it's just hilarious to me. Everybody in this story is a giant twat. Everybody. Down to the man.

It is absurd. As one old school London gangster told author Chris Hollington, no one would walk in fear of Ray and Bill. They never gave anyone cause to. Shatford has to make them look bad because he'd look stupid using 300 coppers to catch some lads who were small time. He didn't even mention Aldo. Nobody had even heard of him.

Poor Aldo. He's like the, he's like the, he's like, he's like the Anne from Arrested Development. Where everyone's like, her, him? The Flying Squad kept the crew under surveillance and brought all their manpower to stake out the dome on days when the tides were high, because those were the only days the crew would be able to make their speedboat getaway. On October 6th, the police were sure the raid was coming. The tides were right, and the vehicles at Tong Farm had been moved to London locations. Shatford reminded his officers that they were waiting for ruthless armed robbers who would be carrying guns.

He had good intelligence on that. His intelligence, assuming he had any at all, and wasn't just making it up, was garbage. The Dome Raiders didn't have guns. They'd never even thought about it. But the cops were loaded for bear. Some armed officers were hidden behind a secret wall inside the dome. Others were disguised as cleaners, with their weapons hidden inside trash cans. Sixty armed officers surreptitiously patrolled the shores of the River Thames, with 20 more out on boats.

Police helicopters and pursuit drivers were on standby. Jesus Jones, y'all think you got enough bandpower? God, it is so ridiculous. They just wanted a big show. And like, I don't want to, do you not have anything better to do? Like, no offense, this is just a shiny rock. Like, I get it. It's worth a lot of money. But like, it's, it's a shiny rock. Okay. It's fine. It's real purdy. We'll show you pictures of it. Followed by police, Ray Betzen started driving the bulldozer towards the dome, wearing a latex face mask over a ski mask to fool any future identification from traffic cameras.

Cockrum, Aldo, and the mysterious Tony followed in a van, along with equipment to monitor police band radio transmissions. A police car started following the van, one that had nothing at all to do with Operation Magician. Both the raiders and the police waiting for them at the dome were on edge. The flying squad needed to catch these guys red-handed. If a random cop pulled the van or bulldozer over, the operation would be a bust. Then, Ray Betzen got a call from Terry Millman on his walkie-talkie. The getaway boat wouldn't start. Ray made a quick decision and pulled the plug.

The bulldozer and van turned around, and the keyed-up coughs at the dome had to chill out. The tides wouldn't be right again for a while. Ray decided they'd take another crack at the dome on November 7th, and surprisingly, he decided to add a new member to the crew the night before. This was Bob Adams of the infamous North London Adams family. And not the goth one, unless I'm. I missed the part where Gomez threatens to shoot off Uncle Fester's kneecap screaming,

Where's me fucking money? It's like Adam Stanley Values meets peeky blinders. I'd watch the shit out of that. I would watch the shit out of that, too. These Adamses were notoriously criminal and violent and not in a fun, quirky way. No, like, severed hands or, like, crawling around the floor. I think they're just on the floor, right? Nobody's tangoing.

They're just all dead. They're just shooting people. Bob Adams, who was 60, but still very scary, knew Bill Cochram through the building trade, and he was happy to join in on the scheme. Ray and Bill decided things would run a lot smoother if Ray stayed in the bulldozer, ready to hit the gas, while Bill and Bob handled the vault. The morning of November 7th started out just like the previous attempt, with the hidden and disguised officers ready and waiting at the dome,

and the raiders driving there in the bulldozer and the van. They had no idea they were being watched every second of the way. At 9.34 a.m., the bulldozer reached the gate in the fence around the dome, with access blocked by a metal post. Ray gunned the dozer, shovel down, and flattened the post like it wasn't even there. Bill, Bob, and Aldo crammed into the bulldozer cab with Ray. They all pulled on gas masks. But there was already a wrinkle in the plan.

The dome entrance they'd been planning to use had always been open when they were scouting, but now it was closed by a metal shutter. They were already committed to the heist, though, so Ray charged forward with the bulldozer, and it smashed through the shutter and into the dome. Debris crashed down, one piece smacking Ray across the face and breaking his nose. He sped through the dome,

police officers disguised as cleaners hauling ass to get out of his way. The bulldozers slammed to a halt outside the Millennium Jules' vault. Aldo jumped out and tossed his first smoke bomb, which billowed out dark clouds. Three other smoke bombs quickly followed. Bill and Bob rushed into the vault. Bill fired the nail gun a few times into the reinforced glass, each shot making a small hole.

Then Bob Adams swung the sledgehammer. The first impact sent cracks all through the glass, and the second punched clean through, making a fist-sized hole. A De Beers security expert would later testify that the glass case was supposed to be able to stand up to heavy assault for 30 minutes. Bill Cochrom's brute force tactic

had gotten through it in 27 seconds. Not to be an insurance nerd, but some poor claims adjuster for Lloyds of London broke out into a cold sweat as the third nail breached the glass. I just, I can feel it in my bones. I know it. He was like, I sense a disturbance in the force.

Yes, exactly. The Millennium Jewels were in their grasp. But not really. See, long before putting the jewels on display, De Beers had had several exact replicas made. In part, this was so they could retain perfect records of what the stones looked like, but more shadily, it meant they could display the millennium jewels in more than one place at the same time. Often, when tourists ooed and odd at the amazing diamonds, what they were actually

looking at were meticulously hand-crafted zircon copies. De Beers would claim they'd never intended to deceive anyone, perish the thought, and always put informative signs up when the fake stones were shown, but nobody who visited or worked at the dome could remember ever seeing a sign like that. Obviously, as soon as they'd gotten wind of a robbery attempt, De Beers had switched in the fake stones. That's the worst part of this whole thing, isn't it? Even if they actually managed to do it, they would not have gotten the diamonds. It just would have been a bunch of cubic taconia. Oh, Lord.

At this point, in the dome security office, Superintendent John Shatford, I cannot get over that name. I'm sorry, just that poor man. John Shatford decided enough was enough and gave the signal for the police to arrest the raiders. Cleaners pulled MP5 submachine guns out of trash cans. Women pulled them out of baby strollers. A fake wall slammed down and armed officers burst out. Tourists and workers were shoved to the ground

with instructions to stay down. An armed officer rushed Aldo Chirochi through the smoke and forced him to the ground. Another pointed his weapon at Ray in the boldest. Dozer cab, yelling, armed police, armed police, show me your hands. Before he could do anything, though, police yanked him out of the cab and threw him down. An officer pinned him down with a boot on his back, yelling, show me your hands, while trapping Betson's hands under him. It was a tense moment. Shatford had, incorrectly, told his officers that the dome raiders would be armed. But Ray finally

managed to yank his empty hands clear, where they were pulled behind his back and secured with plastic cuffs. With all the commotion outside the vault, Bill Cochrom knew the jig was up. He lay face down on the floor with his arms out ahead of him, ready to be taken into custody. It didn't help him much. The police tossed a couple of concussion grenades into the vault to subdue them, and Bill was unconscious when officers rushed in and told him to show them his hands. Three boatloads of armed officers swarmed around the escape boat out on the shore. Terry Millman, no stranger to being arrested, was sipping from a thermos flask when Officer nabbed him. Do you mind if I finish my tea first? He said. Very British. It is. Back at the

flat, she shared with Aldo, Elizabeth Kirsch was listening to Radio News about the robbery attempt. She had absolutely no idea Aldo was involved, right up to the point where there was a knock at the door and a dozen cops barged in to search the place. And then there was Tony, who'd driven the van carrying Bill, Bob, and Aldo. He'd just driven away, and poof, he was gone. John Shatford said he didn't have officers follow the van because, quote, criminals have a sixth sense and he would have known we were there. Yeah, well, that sixth sense would have come in pretty handy when the crew were under constant surveillance for months, not to mention when they were driving into a trap armed with hundreds of cops, but okay.

Yeah. God, that's a hell of a claim. John just every word he says is so obnoxious to me like he's that guy that like has a justification for everything like if you try to like tell him something he's like well I did it because of this and it's like I don't care why you did it don't do it yet the fuck up shut the fuck up Shatford honestly he's like this because of that name I'm sure some people are become funny and some people become terrible cops okay yep yep yeah yeah Ray Bettson's theory is that Tony was working for the cops from the start and had set the whole thing up as a big flashy event to make the flying squad look good.

Who knows? But constant surveillance, 300 officers, and you let one of the crew just drive off without following him, it does smell a little fishy. A lot fishy. Having been caught in the act and with mountains of surveillance records, there was no chance of the crew being let off the hook at trial. The only real question was whether this was theft with violence, which would come with a much stiffer sentence. The definition was kind of vague and required that a suspect, quote, used force on any person or seek to put any person in fear of being then and there subjected to force. The prosecutor, as prosecutors tend to do, went for everything he could. The nail gun and sledgehammer were weapons.

The ammonia-filled Vickspray bottles were weapons. The smoke bombs were weapons. Even the body armor of the Raiders' war were weapons. But the judge, a senior magistrate, who was just shy of retirement and occasionally kind of sleepy during the trial, wouldn't bite. All of those things were tools of the robbery and hadn't been intended to harm anyone. But there was a big yellow elephant in the room, the bulldozer itself, which undercover officers had to flee from as it sped through the dome. That, the judge ruled, lit the case up to theft with violence. And fair enough, being chased by a speeding bulldozer

would absolutely put you in fear for your life. And if anybody had tripped, Ray would have flattened them. Ray Betzen and Bill Cochrom were sentenced to 18 years in prison each. Aldo Cirochi and Bob Adams each got 15. Terry Millman had been so cheerful during his court appearances that the judge had to apologize for repeatedly calling him Mr. Merriman but died of his stomach cancer before the trial began. Bob Adams died of a heart attack six months into his sentence.

Not long after he'd started his stretch, Elizabeth Kirsch visited Aldo in prison, and he pulled the ring pole off his coat can, dropped one knee, and asked her to marry him, which apparently made a couple of his fellow inmates burst into tears. Like, honestly, like, I know we usually roast the criminals, and we have, but, like, that is kind of sweet. It just goes to show, Love don't cost a thing, baby. We don't know what happened to Bill Cochrom, but I guess he got out about the same time as Ray Bettson in 2012. Months after he was released, Ray was part of a crew who tried to rob a Kent Security Depot by ramming a bulldozer through the wall of the cash vault.

But they got the wrong wall and just smashed into a loading dock instead. Honey, honey, stop. Please stop. You're just bad at this. Dude has the opposite of a calling. He has a hang up. It was a busy signal. God. Ray was arrested on DNA evidence and sentenced to 13 years, which I think is the universe telling him to go back to smuggling cigarettes.

Or, you know, just stop doing crimes. As for Aldo Siorochi, well, he apparently failed upwards. His ringpole engagement to Elizabeth stuck. And after he got out of prison, he built what looks like a successful business, reclaiming and repurposing old flooring. The two of them have a family. in a ridiculously gorgeous London flat that they hire out as a location for model shoots and filming, which I'm sure kind of sticks in some people's craw a little bit, but hey, you know,

he did his time, and for society to progress at all, young dipshits have to learn to not be dipshits at all. Are you taking notes, Ray? I hope so, hon. So that was a wild one, right, campers? You know, we'll have another one for you next week. But for now, lock your doors, light your lights, and stay safe until we get together again around the true crime campfire. always, we want to send a grateful shout out to a few of our lovely patrons. Thank you so much to Marianne, Hale, Mel loves to knit, Julie, Gilla, or possibly Gila, it's a lovely name either way, Chris and Erica. We appreciate y'all to the moon and back.

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