5 – City Bonds Robbery in 1990 (£292 Million)
On May 2, 1990, John Goddard was walking down a quiet side street in the City of London holding a briefcase. Nothing unusual about that, you might think except for the fact his case held 301 Treasury Bonds valued at almost £1 million each! As a messenger with a money broker called Sheppard’s, Goddard routinely carried these Bank of England Treasury Bills, but on this day, he ran into a mugger who relieved him of the bonds, which were as good as cash.
Police believe that a petty crook named Patrick Thomas was the mugger, but Thomas couldn’t be charged since he was murdered in December 1991. Five men were eventually arrested in connection with the theft, including Keith Cheeseman, who received a six-and-a-half-year prison sentence. However, he was the only person to serve jail time for the robbery because the other four individuals were acquitted due to lack of evidence. Bizarrely, during the trials of these four men in 1991, no evidence was offered, so they were all able to walk free.
An informant helped the police recover 299 of the bonds, and the FBI and City of London police worked together to infiltrate the gang. There are a few unanswered questions regarding the City Bonds Robbery. First of all, why was Cheeseman the only person convicted? And who murdered Thomas?
Police wrapped up the case relatively quickly, but it seems incredible in such a lucrative robbery that only one man suffered the consequences when the identities of other participants were presumably known. It is also remarkable that one of the largest robberies in history was carried out by a low-level thief using a knife in broad daylight.