Bank Heist of the Century

The vault door of the elegant main branch bank of the Societe Generale in Nice had been a problem for months. So bank officials were not unduly concerned early last Monday when its 50-year-old mechanism seemed stuck again. Then, after hours of unsuccessful tinkering, they decided to break through the vault wall--and made a discovery that caused consternation on yachts and in villas up and down France's fabled Cote d'Azur.

The door had been welded shut--from the inside. Behind it, a group of meticulous weekend robbers had pulled off what French headlines promptly dubbed le fric-frac du siecle (the heist of the century). In daring and imagination, it was in a class with some of the best heist movies ever made. The hoods--police estimate that ten people were involved--had used five tons of excavation and safecracking equipment to get at an estimated $10 million in currency and valuables stored in nine safes and 317 of the bank's 4,000 safe deposit boxes. Awed French cops, when they arrived at the scene of the crime, thought it might be the biggest bank break-in ever, easily surpassing the accepted previous record: $4.3 million stolen from Purolator Security Inc. in Chicago in 1974.

Detectives estimated that the robbers' preparations had taken a full two weeks. Driving vans, they transported their equipment, including six torches, 27 oxyacetylene bottles and several heavy hydraulic jacks, to Nice's Palais des Expositions, roughly a mile from the Place Massena, the town center. There they dismantled crash barriers that blocked access to an underground roadway built for sewermen alongside the River Paillon, which runs below street level through the middle of town. Following the road to a point near the Place Massena, they connected with a sewerage line that led about 440 yds. to a point 30 ft. from the bank's strong room. Then they laid out half a mile of electric cable, attaching it to the power supply of an underground municipal parking lot. Now, with light and power assured, they began tunneling to their goal. The fastidious crooks professionally shored their tunnel with metal stanchions and wooden beams set in concrete. They also installed electric lights, a portable fan and thick industrial carpeting; evidently they did not want to track dirt into the vault.

After breaking through a 4 1/2-ft.-thick wall into the strong room, the thieves used their jacks to move a five-ton safe that stood in their way. Then, with their six torches, they attacked the strongroom safes. Among the spoils they found were the entire weekend receipts from Nice's biggest department stores and the bank's ready cash for the following week. In the safe deposit boxes they discovered the items that might be expected on the French Riviera: gold, silver, jewelry, bonds, rare stamps and paintings. At least one box contained a portfolio of hardest-core pornographic photos, which the looters, in evident appreciation, decoratively pasted on the vault walls.

The robbers also attended to their other appetites: they apparently brought along a chef. Using a gas-powered portable stove, he whipped up a four-course meal that included soup, charcuterie, an entree, dessert and wine. The robbers brought no dishes with them, knowing there would be plenty of fine silver plate available.

What finally stopped the robbers was the rise of water in the sewage system, the result of heavy late-weekend rains. Otherwise, they might have doubled or trebled their loot. Said one policeman: "If it hadn't rained, God knows how much more they would have taken."

Aghast Officials. The gang floated its swag back through the sewers and to the waiting vans in a collapsible rubber boat and on a raft made of inner tubes. A note that the industrious looters left behind, signed with an inverted peace symbol, said simply: "No gunplay, no violence, no hate."

Bank officials were aghast, as well they might be. The managing director, Jacques Guenet, had been so convinced of his vault's impregnability that he had failed to install any kind of electronic alarm system. To save on wages, he had even sent the night watchman home on weekends. Guenet's wealthy depositors were displeased, to put it mildly. On the day following the discovery, angry crowds clogged the streets in front of the Societe Generale.

A promise that the bank would make good any losses only seemed to darken the mood. Indeed, one old woman fainted at the news and had to be brought around with brandy. To gain restitution, the depositors would have to declare the contents of their boxes, something that the law does not normally require of them. But in France, where hiding wealth from tax collectors under mattresses and in bank vaults is a national custom, such declarations promised to expose many depositors to trouble from the government.

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