Lufthansa heist
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The 1978 Lufthansa Heist was planned by Jimmy Burke, an associate of the Lucchese crime family, and carried out by several of his associates. It all began when bookmaker Martin Krugman told Henry Hill (an associate of Jimmy Burke's) about millions of dollars in untraceable money. The money was flown in once a month and was exchanged by servicemen and tourists in West Germany and was then stored in a cardboard vault at Kennedy Airport. The information had come from Louis Werner, who owed Krugman $20,000 in gambling debts and worked at the airport.
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[edit] Planning and execution
Werner was helping Krugman throughout the planning and even told him where the robbers should park. Burke worked out the kinks and intricacies at Robert's Lounge. He needed 5 or 6 men to go in on the inside and 2 on the outside, they would require 2 panel trucks to transport the cash. Burke decided on Tommy DeSimone and Joe Manri, as well as Angelo Sepe and Sepe's ex-brother in law, Anthony Rodriguez, as inside gunmen. Also, Louie Cafora and Paolo LoCastri, a Sicilian shooter, and a black man named Parnell 'Stacks' Edwards.
Once everyone was together Jimmy told Paul Vario, who sent his son, Peter, to collect his 'end' of the loot. Also Vinne Asaro, who was the Bonnano family's crew chief at the airport would be owed money because Burke, a Lucchese associate, was performing the robbery on Bonnano territory.
On December 11th, at 3.12 a.m. a guard named Kelly Whalen, patrolling the cargo terminal, spotted a black Ford Econoline van pulling into a bay near a loading platform for vaults. Whalen walked toward the loading bay to investigate this peculiar appartion and was struck over the head with a .45 pistol. A wiry man in a black ski mask pulled his mask over his face as the blood began to pour from Whalen's wound. Another man grabbed Whalen's gun and thus disarmed him. Whalen was ordered by the two men to disarm the silent alarm. After he did this he was handcuffed behind his back. He saw a series of other men, all carrying rifles or pistols, running into the cargo terminal and then another man took his wallet and said that they knew where his family were and that they had men ready to visit them. Whalen nodded to indicate that he would co-operate with the thieves.
Another guard, Rolf Rebmann, heard a noise by the loading ramp and when he went to investigate, 6 armed, masked men forced their way in and handcuffed him. They then used a one-of-a-kind key from Werner and walked through a maze of corridors to where the two other employees would be. Once these two had been rounded up two gunmen ventured downstairs to look for unexpected visitors and then the other men marched the employees to a lunch room, where the other employees were on a 3 a.m. break. The gunmen burst into the lunch room and brandishing their firearms they showed a bloodied Whalen as an indication of their intentions if anyone got out of line. They knew each employee by name and forced them onto the ground. They made John Murray, the terminal's senior cargo agent, call Rudi Eirich on the intercom. The robbers knew that Eirich was the only guard that night who knew the right combinations to open the double door vault. Murray was made to pretend to Eirich that there was a problem with a load from Frankfurt and told Eirich to meet him in the cafeteria. As Eirich approached the cafe he was met by two shotguns and he saw the other employees bound and gagged on the cafeteria floor. One gunman kept watch over the 10 employees and the other 3 took Eirich at gun point down two flights of stairs to the double door vault. He later reported that the men were informed and knew all about the safety systems in the vault and they knew about the double door system, whereby one door must be shut or the other one can't be opened without activating the alarm. The men ordered Eirich to open up the first door, to a 10-by-20 foot room. They knew that if he opened up the second door he would activate an alarm to the Port Authority. Once inside they ordered Eirich to lie on the ground and they then began sifting through invoices and freight manifests to determine which parcels they wanted of the many similarly wrapped ones. Finally they began hurling parcels through, one nearly hit Eirich's head, he saw it kicked open and said that inside was stacks and stacks of cash. Around 40 parcels were removed and Eirich was made to lock the inner door before unlocking the outer door. Two of the gunmen were assigned to load the parcels into the vans while the others tied up Eirich. A man, without a ski mask on, burst into the cafeteria and was euphoric. He said to the other gunmen that they had the money in the vans. He was quickly told to put on his ski mask by the other thieves, however some of the employees caught a glimpse of his face. They were told not to call the Port Authority until 4:30 a.m. When the men left it was 4:16 a.m. according to the cafeteria clock and no calls were made until 4:30, when a report of $5 million in cash and $875,000 in jewels being stolen was made. The employees complied because they knew if the police caught the men they or their families would be harmed or even killed. The robbery took only 64 minutes and was the largest cash robbery ever committed on American soil at the time.
[edit] Aftermath
Parnell Steven Edwards, Frank James Burke, Angelo Sepe and his 19-year-old girlfriend Joanne Lomabardo, Louis and Joanna Cafora, Joe Manri, Frenchy McMahon, Paolo LiCastri, Teressa Ferrara, and Martin Krugman would all be murdered after the robbery. DeSimone was later murdered due to having carried out the unrelated murder of William Devino.
Edwards was shot to death in his apartment, supposedly by DeSimone and Angelo Sepe on December 18, 1978. Edwards was supposed to take the van used in the burglary to a car compactor to have it destroyed; instead, he got high on marijuana while en route to the junkyard, left the van in a ditch, and wandered back to his apartment to get drunk. Within the week, authorities discovered the van and identified it as the vehicle used in the burglary. Edwards's finger prints were later found on the wheel of the vehicle, and a muddy shoe print found at the airport was matched to a pair of tennis shoes Edwards owned.
The dates on which each of the victims were murdered are as follows: Parnell Edwards (18th December, 1978); Martin Krugman (6th January, 1979) was the only body never found because it was dismembered and disposed of by Angelo Sepe and Jimmy Burke; Tereasa Ferrara (10th February, 1979); Thomas Monteleone (March, 1979); the newly wed Louis and Joanna Cafora (March, 1979); Joe 'Buddha' Marni and Robert McMahon (16th May, 1979); Frank James Burke (18th May 1979); Paolo LiCastri (13th June, 1979); and Angelo Sepe, who was murdered with his girlfriend Joanna Lombardo (18th July, 1979). Angelo Sepe's ex-brother-in-law, Anthony Rodriguez, survived the aftermath and was later arrested for arson and car theft.
Prior to the killing spree that followed the Lufthansa Heist the Federal Bureau of Investigation set up surveillance of the Burke crew and their headquarters, Robert's Lounge. They set up round-the-clock surveillance of Burke, Anthony Rodriguez, Angelo Sepe, and Tommy DeSimone. There were undercover officers dressed as cargo workers and truckers who began hanging around Robert's Lounge and the Owl Tavern. FBI Agent Edward McDonald received court approval to install bugging devices in DeSimone, Burke and Sepe's cars. For the 8 weeks following the heist there was trickery on the part of Burke's crew and the authorities. The FBI followed them in spotter planes and helicopters, and they would drive into restricted-flight zones. The FBI even leaked stories about the heist to newspapers in the hope of stimulating incriminating talk in the bugged cars. Burke perpetually had 2 FBI cars tailing him. The hi-tech bugs were foiled when Burke, DeSimone and Sepe turned up their car radios to full-blast.
The reason that Burke murdered the participants in the robbery varied: He killed Louie and Joanna Cafora because Cafora showed off his new found wealth by buying a Cadillac. Sepe bought a new white Ford Thunderbird. Joe Manri was killed because if Lou Werner testified the only crew member he had ever met was Manri, and if Manri was dead then the FBI couldn't get Werner to inform on Burke. McMahon was in the wrong place at the wrong time, he was the best friend of Joe Manri and as such they were always around each other. They were both found dead, slumped in the front seats of a 1973 Buick parked on Schenectedy Avenue, in the Mill Basin area of Brooklyn. Both had been killed with a single shot to the back of the head with a .44 caliber pistol. Teressa Ferrara had once shared an Ozone Park apartment with Tommy DeSimone and received an urgent call telling her that she was to receive $1,000. Her torso was found on a beach a while later.
[edit] The informants
Peter Gruenwald, a Lufthansa insider, testified against his fellow employee, Louis Werner. William Fischetti, Frank Menna, and Janet Barbieri also testified against Werner before a Grand Jury.
In the aftermath of the heist, Henry Hill became a government witness, but a conviction against Burke or Vario for the Lufthansa Heist wasn't successful due to the lack of other robbers still alive.
[edit] The ending
Jimmy Burke was convicted of murdering Richard Eaton. He died in prison of stomach cancer in 1996.
Henry Hill entered the Witness Protection Program, then left and currently lives in an unknown part of the USA.
Peter Gruenwald is now living somewhere in the USA under a new identity.
The Ferrara family still refuse to accept Theresa's death. No one has been charged with her murder and/or disappearance.
Martin Krugman's body was never found, in 1986 he was declared legally deceased and his wife, Fran, received a $135,000 pay-out from his life insurance policy.
The murder of Paolo LiCastri is still officially unsolved.
The murders of Joe Manriquez (a.k.a Joe Manri) of Robert 'French' McMahon remain officially unsolved.
The murder of Angelo Sepe is still officially unsolved.
The bodies of Louis and Joanna Cafora have never been found.
Tommy DeSimone's body was found in October 2004. Based on the testimony of Joe Massino, the FBI dug out John Gotti's old graveyard "The Hole" in Queens, where they found the corpses of DeSimone, Sonny Black (who was executed two months after the Donnie Brasco investigation), Phillip "Lucky Philly" Giaccone and Domonick "Big Trin" Trinchera.
Frank James Burke was convicted of a charge relating to firearms in 1984 and was killed during an abortive narcotics trial in 1987.
Paul Vario died in prison, of respiratory illness, in 1988, aged 73.
Louis Werner married Janet Barbieri following Werner's release from prison, they now live under a new identity somewhere in the USA.
[edit] See also
- Air France Robbery (1967)
- GoodFellas - a semi-fictionalized account of this heist takes place in the film
[edit] Sources
- Lufthansa heist info
- Wiseguy written by Henry Hill and Nicholas Pileggi
- Gangsters and GoodFellas' Henry Hill, as told by Gus Russo
- The Heist, Ernest Volkman and John Cummings
