Charles Dickens - Julian Barnes - Armando’s Tale of Charles Dickens TV - Panorama TV - Heists: Britain’s Biggest Cash Grab TV - ITV News at Ten - BBC News TV - Britain’s Biggest Heists TV - Mark Austin TV - Howard Sounes - Crimes That Shocked Britain TV -
Kent, sir – everybody knows Kent – apples, cherries, hops, and women. Charles Dickens, Pickwick Papers
One weekend in the vacation, I was invited to meet her family. They lived in Kent, out on the Orpington line, in one of those suburbs which had stopped concreting over nature at the very last minute, and ever since smugly claimed rural status. Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending
This is Dickens’ World in Kent – a vast tourist attraction built to take visitors inside the novels of Charles Dickens. Armando’s Tale of Charles Dickens, BBC 2016
Scandal in the City: we investigate the man who gambled billions and lost. The industry knew Neil Woodford was in trouble but no-one told investors. We also reveal how another money man was doing secret deals on the side. As hundreds of thousands count the cost of the Woodford scandal, we confront the man himself. Panorama: Can You Trust the Billion Pound Investors? Richard Bilton investigates, BBC 2019
Kent County Council tried and failed to take its money back: £260 million of pension cash. ibid.
22nd February 2006: news of the greatest cash heist this country has ever seen hits the headlines. It was a daring raid netting the criminals a staggering £53 million. Heists: Britain’s Biggest Cash Grab s1e4, Channel 5 2017
They kidnapped and terrorised innocent people. ibid.
Security at the cash depot has only one real weakness – its staff. ibid.
The manager of a cash depot Colin Gibson has been kidnapped and is being forced to help a gang of criminals get inside a secure cash vault in Tonbridge Kent. ibid.
Inside this room is more than a quarter of a billion pounds in cash. The used notes are stored in cages, colour-coded according to value. ibid.
Forget the Great Train Robbery. Forget the Northern Bank in Belfast. Britain’s biggest ever robbery took place in the early hours of this morning in Kent. ITV News at Ten 2006
‘The worst night of my life’: a depot manager’s account of his terrifying ordeal.’ BBC News 2006
A highly organised attack; the callous gang terrorised their victims for hours. Stealing a record £53 million they fled into the night. This is the dramatic story of the Securitas heist. Britain’s Biggest Heists, 2010
21st February 2006: the Securitas Depot in Kent, south-east England. Staff are part-way through their evening shifts sorting money ... Held against their will, the staff had no choice but to comply. ibid.
The depot manager, his wife and young child, had been kidnapped at gunpoint prior to the raid and forced to reveal confidential information. ibid.
With all this evidence only days into the inquiry detectives decided to visit some of their suspects. ibid.
Kent police ... capturing most of the main suspects and recovering nearly £23 million. ibid.
They disappeared into the night with half a ton of cash mostly in ten and twenty pound notes. Real Crime with Mark Austin: Britain’s Biggest Heist, ITV 2010
Medway House: the Securitas cash depot was used to sort and circulate cash around the country for the Bank of England. Money used to service cash-points and shops. ibid.
They fixed on this man: manager Colin Dixon, married with a child, he’d been with Securitas four years. ibid.
For the next hour the robbers went backwards and forwards filling their lorry with money using cages, holdalls and even a shopping trolley ... The robbers had filled the lorry with £53 million in new and used bank notes. They had to leave behind £154 million. ibid.
Within hours their carefully laid plans were about to unravel. ibid.
This Kent gang were a pretty hopeless bunch of amateur misfits, knuckleheads, bruisers. I mean these weren’t heavy-duty criminals ... Pretty thick a lot of them. Howard Sounes, author Heist
On the night of 21st February 2006 a gang of armed criminals stormed the Securitas Depot in Kent. Crimes That Shocked Britain