http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,11764320%255E663,00.html
23dec04
ONE of the biggest heists in history has left the National Australia Bank with a $50 million headache.
In a Hollywood-style raid, the 20-strong Irish gang robbed the NAB-owned Northern Bank in Belfast as thousands shopped and sang Christmas carols nearby.
The families of two senior executives were held for 24 hours in a forest while bankers were forced to co-operate under threat of death.
Investigators believe the spectacular raid was the work of either IRA or Loyalist paramilitaries who have turned to peacetime organised crime.
"This is not a lucky crime, this is a well-organised crime," Assistant Chief Constable Sam Kinkaid said.
There was speculation that the haul could be as high as $75 million.
The full cost of the heist will be met by the NAB, even though it announced last Tuesday it had reached an agreement to sell Northern Bank to a Danish banking chain.
"The theft is covered by self-insurance and, as such, NAB will bear the impact of any losses arising from the theft," Melbourne-based NAB spokesman Brandon Phillips confirmed yesterday.
The raid began Sunday night (British time) when the families were taken hostage at gunpoint.
They were driven away to be held at a mystery site in cold conditions.
On Monday morning, the executives were told to head to work and act as if nothing was wrong.
In the evening, the gang met the managers to get special security codes and clear out the underground vaults full of Christmas cash.
It took two hours for the criminals to move the cash to a waiting truck in a nearby street.
An unknown amount was left behind because there was no more room in the getaway van.
By 10pm, 24 hours after the ordeal began, the bank managers were freed to be reunited with their families.
The raid was similar to the 2001 Hollywood movie Bandits, in which Bruce Willis and Billy Bob Thornton kidnap bank managers and sleep at their houses before looting the cash.
Most of the money stolen was in Northern Bank notes and sterling printed by other banks in the province, making it hard to launder.
Mr Kinkaid refused to say whether the robbers had exposed flaws in security arrangements.
And he refused to say if terrorists were under suspicion
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