Ghantt reported to Chambers that his supply of money was running low, but Chambers sent Ghantt just $8,000. Hed never really been in trouble, he wasnt a career criminal, said retired FBI agent John Wydra. Soon thereafter, he met Kelly Campbell, a co-worker at Loomis Fargo. Steve Chambers would keep the rest. Current price is $11.49, Original price is $14.99. - Husband and wife Steven and Michelle Chambers, whose conspicuous consumption of a luxury home, a BMW convertible, breast implants and a $600 wooden Indian, among other purchases, helped the FBI solve the crime, were assessed $3.81 million and $4.8 million, respectively. More calls between the two men, and also between Steve and Kelly Campbell, made it clear that the group was starting to turn on David Ghantt. The property has changed hands several times since then. You cannot fine low-income people millions of dollars. Booklist "Librariesshould consider purchasing this entertaining and lightly edited version, which reads like a fast-paced novel." Loomis Fargo, the nation's largest privately held armored- car company, used vans to transport hundreds of millions of dollars a day belonging to banks and other businesses, stocking automated teller machines and storing money in the Loomis vault between deliveries. "Don't double-cross us," the woman on the phone told David Ghantt. Turns out, most of the thieves and their accomplices have been about as effective coming up with their court-ordered restitution as they were hiding their original crimes. Butcher says the federal courts in the Western District of North Carolina have never handled a case quite like Loomis. Probably very egotistical of me, I thought, Yeah, sure, I can beat them, theyre college smart and thats about it, Ghantt said. Loomis Fargo heist: 25 years later Former FBI agent John Wydra, who helped crack the case, sat down with Channel 9 Reporter Glenn Counts to talk about the clues that led to solving the crime, and how the group got caught. Not every agent has a case like that, he said. Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Then, keeping with the plan, Ghantt took $50,000 (the maximum that could be taken across the border by law without further authorization) with him and left for Mexico, winding up at the popularYucatan Peninsularesort ofCozumel. What that says is, We will never forgive you for what youve done.'. Discover some of the worlds strangest ancient places. As a privately owned web site, we reserve the right to edit or Learn how to enable JavaScript on your browser. Thats pretty standard in restitution matters. Inside $3.3 million was located along with the two stolen surveillance tapes, apparently left due to the robber and his accomplices being sloppy, or in a hurry. He also stole both existing sets of vault keys and hurried into the manager's office, where three TV security screens and two VCRs were visible. Some of the biggest numbers remaining on the Loomis collection board, as is the case with Campbell, belong to those who played the biggest role in the crime: - David Ghantt, the Loomis employee who loaded all that money 2,800 pounds in all into the back of a company van before escaping to Mexico, has paid just under $50,000 of the $3.81 million he was assessed. remove comments that contain spam, advertising, vulgarity, threats If a prank seemed dangerous, David backed out. He realized his bosses would know he had worked that day and that he was missing, but maybe without a video they would think he'd been held at gunpoint and taken hostage, or even better, that he'd been killed. Friends of Campbell had also begun spending large amounts of cash. This station is part of Cox Media Group Television. Ghantts spending in Mexico was extravagant at first. A few of the Loomis restitution cases have already been closed either because the amount was paid in full or because the 20-year clock wound down. Heist! He knew his mother would be traumatized, shocked, and appalled. them. Youre supposed to get less time for cooperating, a lesser penalty, and instead, you see what she got hit with. Gronquist said. NASCAR. Ghantt had fled to Mexico with $50,000 in cash, leaving the rest of the money with Steve Chambers. Who was she to be pressuring him? You cannot fine low-income people millions of dollars. And with Loomis, were looking at only one case. Their only intimate physical contact had been kissing on a mid-September night when they had driven her pickup truck to a field behind a shooting range in Gaston County to discuss their plans and the theft's chance of success. So we were able to figure out with all the denominations, it would require about 20 safe deposit boxes to store it all.. Campbell, a former Loomis employee and one of the original masterminds of the caper, has paid off less than $21,000 of the $4,701,694.18 she was docked. More than half of the amount came from the seizure of a luxury home purchased by husband-and-wife defendants during their post-heist spending spree. I actually loved reading through this post. In Florida, a Loomis Fargo employee had pulled a gun on his coworkers and gotten away with $18 million, a move that FBI agents theorize Ghantt, Campbell and other employees all sat around talking about - and what they would do with that amount of money - for a while. But you cant get blood from a stone, Johns said. The biggest restitution numbers for victims of financial crimes generally involve Ponzi schemes or sweepstakes fraud, not cash thefts. He worked close-by to where the van and over $3 million dollars had been ditched, and was friends with Steve Chambers. Steve Chambers and his wife were living in a trailer and upgraded to what would today be a multi-million-dollar mansion at Cramer Mountain. Learn about careers at Cox Media Group. Diamant, a journalist who reported on the case at the time, goes into meticulous detail on how the heist was pulled off and its aftermath. He hated his job and his bosses, he'd lost hope in his marriage, he wasn't going to advance at Loomis, and he couldn't afford to quit to enroll in college. "So he stays behind and moving over two thousand pounds of . Many of the lesser players in the conspiracy have been the most effective in paying their debts. Campbell used to work for Loomis and continued the friendship with Ghantt, eventually hooking him up with Chambers. David placed their odds of success at 85 percent, a confidence inspired by faith not just in his planning but also in his feelings for Kelly. It was 2:00 p.m. on October 4, 1997, and tension was building between two planners of what would rank high among the largest heists in United States history. The Loomis defendants face no additional legal jeopardy for not paying off their debts. Yet their lives seemed far easier and better than his. Enforcement of this policy is at the They had met in December 1995 on one of her first days at Loomis. How did they get away with stealing more than $17 million? And then I realized that a lot of people knew who I was and they had followed the case.. For people earning $8.15 an hour David's salary the jokes came naturally. What that says is, We will never forgive you for what youve done. But if you did, youll never forget it. It should have been easy, but for some reason the gate didn't open for him. In one case, the restitution for a Loomis defendant may be a moving target. As an adult, he preferred Shakespeare, Tom Clancy, and any book he could find about the Federal Bureau of Investigation. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience. A woman by the name of Kelly Campbell had worked there in 1996, and she and Ghantt had become friends in that time. Its a once-in-a-lifetime thing, and I went down and talked to them, got to meet Zach Galifianakis and the director, Ghantt said. So that was kind of like this once-in-a-lifetime thing, Wydra said. The inspiration behind the major motion picture Masterminds starring Zach Galifianakis, Owen Wilson, Kristen Wiig, and Jason Sudeikis! At 2:20 p.m., the phone rang; it was Kelly again. (LogOut/ "I was unhappy with my life. Johnson had stolen $18.8 million earlier in the year, on March 19, 1997, only to be caught five months later, in late August, while crossing into Texas from Mexico to retrieve some of the money, which he'd hidden in a shed in mountainous western North Carolina. While Ghantt waited for the heat from the robbery to die down, Chambers would send Ghantt small amounts of money. So the pieces were falling into place for investigators. In addition, he also rented Mike his own apartment, paid him $400/weekly and bought him a gun. They didnt expect it.. On Oct. 5, the Loomis heist celebrates its 25th birthday. That movie, Masterminds, was filmed in 2014. When Ghantt called Campbell asking for more money, a plan was set in motion to take him out. Still facing possible unknowns of other people involved, the FBI needed to gather more information without the suspects getting suspicious of them. More than half of the amount came from the seizure of a luxury home purchased by husband-and-wife defendants during their post-heist spending spree. [DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks]. Their most important conversation occurred one afternoon in August 1997 after Kelly paged him at work. Jim Gronquist, Campbells defense attorney during the Loomis case, says the financial penalties levied against his client and her co-defendants are grossly excessive and unjust, particularly since most of the stolen Loomis money was actually recovered. David was supposed to be showing him the ropes of the job, which included cash pickups and deliveries. We went on a mission to calculate exactly how much size-wise the money was, $11.3 million in $20 bills, and it weighed over 2,000 pounds, former FBI agent John Wydra said. Also charged with money laundering were innocent relatives and friends who had co-signed safe deposit boxes. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. Loomis Fargo employees could not open the vault the next morning, and called the police. Four-wheeling. The figures can be astounding. He put on his best pair of jeans, a button-down shirt, and his nicest cowboy boots. Afterward, everything became comical. But that only tells part of the story. She had attitude. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. What it does is put a ball and chain on that person for the rest of their lives, they are walking around and they are basically an indentured servant, Gronquist said. Chambers had broached the possibility of a robbery to Campbell earlier in the summer. David was thin six-foot-one, one hundred sixty-five pounds and heaving the stacks onto the cart, pushing the cart toward the vault door, and then emptying its contents into the van was exhausting. The FBI began to question past and current employees of Loomis Fargo. She sounded incredulous. All but one of the defendants pleaded guilty. He tried again to make the back gate rise, to no avail. He said at first, they were very proud of what they had been able to do. Since then, there have been numerous articles, books, documentaries and even a movie about this gang -- the gang that couldnt shoot straight. It, too, has changed hands several times. "For the first year after a crime," he told her, "they're all over you, with six to ten agents. He was a hard worker, smart enough, and had graduated from high school. Enabling JavaScript in your browser will allow you to experience all the features of our site. In the grand scheme of things, the prison sentence for stealing $20 million wouldn't be much worse than for stealing just $500,000 maybe a few extra years behind bars. We are happy to work with other website publishers. And once he started, he didn't stop with one cartful. The figures can be astounding. Then, he proceeded to load 2,800 pounds of cash into a van. She had attitude. Husband and wife Steven and Michelle Chambers, whose conspicuous consumption of a luxury home, a BMW convertible, breast implants and a $600 wooden Indian, among other purchases, helped the FBI solve the crime, were assessed $3.81 million and $4.8 million, respectively. As it neared its end, David stealthily left the vault door ajar. Afterward, she and David would talk just occasionally on the phone. "About fourteen or fifteen million dollars," he said. In 1994, they moved to Gastonia, North Carolina, where they had grown up, and David took a job driving a forklift. Now one of the most wanted men in America with the FBI hot on his heels, Ghantt must figure out how to get his money, get away from a hit man, and get even. Federal law stops government collection efforts 20 years after a defendant leaves prison. You have permission to edit this article. According to Butcher, Campbells last official payment came in June 2021 when the government appears to have seized a tax refund of $81.24. Since Ghantt was the supervisor, he sent his co-worker home first. They assumed that whoever was involved would keep the cash in a safe place, like a safe deposit box. Paying the money back has taken a lot longer, and time is running out for the U.S. government to collect. Guller was the attorney for Steven Chambers, who came up with the original idea for the Loomis theft. Available on Compatible NOOK Devices and the free NOOK Apps. But after a year, they cut it down to two agents. And after two years, the case is just a file. "Do you know how much there's gonna be?" He played high school football at Mays High School in Atlanta, and college football at Georgia Tech . Many of the lesser players in the conspiracy have been the most effective in paying their debts. Thirty years! A more immediate need was securing help to move the stolen money to safety the night of the crime. The biggest restitution numbers for victims of financial crimes generally involve Ponzi schemes or sweepstakes fraud, not cash thefts. You should definitely start your own blog, I highly recommend it. Click here to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Action News Jax live. (John D. Simmons/The Charlotte Observer via AP). Next month, Payne will back in the Charlotte federal courthouse, this time to be sentenced from weapons and methamphetamine trafficking charges. David Ghantt (Zach Galifianakis), an employee of Loomis Fargo, robbed his own vault, left the $17.3 million in cash with his co-conspirators, Kelly Campbell (Kristen Wiig) and Steve Chambers (Owen Wilson) and fled the country to Mexico.
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