The Power of Illusion in the Greatest Heists of All Time

THE POWER OF ILLUSION IN THE GREATEST HEISTS OF ALL TIME DREW THOMAS MAGIC magic principle -2005 A "THREE CARD MONTE" SWITCH Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam Considered the world's largest diamond heist, thieves dressed in KLM uniforms and driving a stolen KLM truck stole gems valued at $118 million in February 2005. After forcing the true guards of an identical KLM truck to lie facedown on the road, the thieves switched trucks and drove away with the diamonds. magic principle • 2003 ELECTROMAGNETISM AND LOCK-PICKING The Antwerpe Diamond Heist Dubbèd the "Heist of the Century" thieves made off with $100 million worth of diamonds, loose jewels and jewellery from the Antwerp Diamond center in 2003. The vault the thieves broke into was protected by a multitude of security mechanisms, including a magnetic field and a lock with a 100 possibly combinations. In the spirit of Harry magic principle Houdini, the robbers, two of which were dubbed – 2002 the "Magician with Keys" and "King of TRICK IS IMPOSSIBLE TO RECUNSTRUCT Thieves", used lock-picking and Museum of Science, The Hague electromagnetism to break into the vault. Approxímately $12 million in jewels were stolen from the Museum of Science in December of 2002, and no one has any idea how the thieves did it. Like true magicians, they left no telltale sign of how the heist magic principle was pulled off. By setting off no motion detectors or 2000 alarming the guards, the thieves managed to just vanish - along with the jewels. A MAGICIAN MUST ALWAYS BE AHEAD OF HIS AUDIENCE Millennium Dome Raid, London In this unsuccessful heist, the police were, ahead of the robbers. The Police dubbed their interference with the thieves plans "Operation- Magician" and hid behind a dummy walt in addition to posing as custodians to pounce on the thieves as they entered the Dome. Police also swapped the De Beers Millenium Star magic principle diamond, valued at $200 million, for a decoy. AUDIENCE'S SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEVE – 1994 Carlton Hotel Robbery Thieves wielding machine guns and shooting madly entered the Carlton Hotel in August of 1994 and coerced magic principle 1990 employees into relinquishing $30 million in jewels from the hotel safe. It was later INSTANT CHANGE OF CLOTHES revealed that the bullets everyone was so terrified of were, in fact, blanks. Gardner Museum Heist Despite being advised to never let anyone in after hours, guards of the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum were tricked into doing so on March 18, 1990 by two thieves dressed as Boston Police officers. Their simple disguises were enough to convince both guards to let their guard down, long enough for the thieves to handcuff them to pipes and magic principle walk away with $500 billion in artwork. - 1983 TAKING ADVANTAGE OF THE SITUATION Heathrow Gold Heist Thieves in this case hoped to walk away with $3 million. Instead, they stumbled upon a safe holding gold bullion valued at $26 million. Capitalizing on the coincidence, as all good magicians do, the thieves walked magic principle • 1945 away with millions more than they expected. HYPNITISM Reichsbank Robbery The 1996 Guinness Book of World Records touts this as "The Greatest Robbery on Record". Between 1945 and 1947, thieves stole over $3 magic principle billion in Nazi gold. The two-year long robbery is 1935 still unresolved but eyewitnesses claim to have MISDIRECTION seen security guards and bank officials transport- ing the gold bullion out of various banks. Does the fault lie in corruption or hypnotism? Croydon Airport Heist In 1935, the lax security of Imperial Airways allowed three men to walk into the airport strongroom unchallenged and leave with $12 million in gold "bullion. How did they do it? Simple misdirection! IIThe only guard on duty went to meet a German airliner while the men strolled off with the money. Facebook.com/DrewThomasMagicman @DrewThomasMagic Youtrabe YouTube.com/DrewThomasMagic MATERIAL ZE DREW THOMAS MAGIC Sources: http://www.croydonguardian.co.uk/news/heritage/4075336.Secrets_of_gold_bullion_heis t_revealed http://nazigold.greyfalcon.us/rbr.html http://nowyouseememovie.com/timeline/ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/resources/theft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antwerp_Diamond_Heist http://tinybytes.me/facts/biggest-thefts-in-history?page=12 DREWTHOMASMAGIC.COM/PRESS-KIT