In the early hours of Thursday, 8 August 1963, sixteen masked men ambushed the Glasgow-Euston mail train at Sears Crossing in Buckinghamshire. Making off with a record haul of £2.6 million, the robbers received approximately £150,000 each (over £2 million in today’s money). While twelve of the robbers were jailed over the next five years, four were never brought to justice – they evaded arrest and thirty-year prison sentences, and lived out the rest of their lives in freedom. In stark contrast t...
“The ultimate truffle true crime tale”*: A thrilling journey through the hidden underworld of the world's most prized luxury ingredient. *Bianca Bosker, New York Times bestselling author of Cork Dork Beneath the gloss of star chefs and crystal-laden tables, the truffle supply chain is touched by theft, secrecy, sabotage, and fraud. Farmers patrol their fields with rifles and fear losing trade secrets to spies. Hunters plant poisoned meatballs to eliminate rival truffle-hunting dogs. Naive buy...
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK A modern classic of personal journalism, The Orchid Thief is Susan Orlean’s wickedly funny, elegant, and captivating tale of an amazing obsession. Determined to clone an endangered flower—the rare ghost orchid Polyrrhiza lindenii—a deeply eccentric and oddly attractive man named John Laroche leads Orlean on an unforgettable tour of America’s strange flower-selling subculture, through Florida’s swamps and beyond, along with the Seminol...
Murder & Mayhem in Columbus, Ohio (Murder & Mayhem)
by Nellie Kampmann
"Doris Payne is an unapologetic badass." - Tessa Thompson, Actress This is the sensational and compelling memoir of the world's most notorious jewel thief - a woman who defied society's prejudices and norms to carve her own path, and live out her dreams. She stole diamonds from the people who underestimated her, she exploited the men who tried to domesticate her, and she consistently defied society's assumptions and prejudices to create a new life for herself. For fans of Catch Me If You Can, T...
'A warts-and-all memoir of an ex-cop from probationer days on. Fascinating' IAN RANKIN'A humane but unflinching look at the sharp end of contemporary policing' LUKE JENNINGS'I loved this book. Gritty and gripping, moving and shocking, this brilliant police memoir shows that life on the force really is different for girls' ERIN KELLY Welcome to London. Population: 8.7 million. And it's your job to keep them safe. A no-holds-barred account of life on the front line of policing, On the Line follows...
The Great Train Robbery and the Metropolitan Police Flying Squad
by Geoff Platt
The Squad that investigated The Great Train Robbery. "The Old Grey Fox" or "One Day Tommy" (Detective Chief Superintendent Tommy Butler) selected six of the best officers on the elite Metropolitan Police Flying Squad to investigate the Crime of the Century, but whilst many books have been written by and about every criminal arrested for this crime, NONE have been written about the detectives who traced and tracked them. Tommy Butler delayed his retirement to complete the job, but died a few mont...
In 1987, the Good Train Robbery involved the smash and grab of a Barking bound goods train and the theft of thousands of pounds worth of athletic wear. A carriage full of branded sports goods were taken by a new East End firm who then tried to sell the haul in Dagenham's famous market - with unexpected results.
People have been collecting—and stealing—books since even before Gutenberg invented the printing press. Internationally, according to Interpol, rare book theft is more widespread than fine art theft. In The Man Who Loved Books Too Much, Allison Hoover Bartlett takes us deep inside the world of rare books and tells the cat-and-mouse story of two men caught in its allure. She introduces us to John Gilkey, an unrepentant, obsessive book thief, and Ken Sanders, the equally obsessive self-styled “bib...
When Shirley Pitts died tragically young in 1992 the most famous of the criminal underworld were present or represented at her funeral. Even the Krays sent their condolences. Shirley Pitts, the eldest of six children was born upside down on 24 november 1934. Her "career" began by thieving bread off doorsteps and coal from coalcarts. Her father's bungled attempts at blackmarketering and her dipsomaniac mother's inadequacies made Shirley resolve not only to be a first-class thief but also the best...
Sandtown is one of the deadliest neighbourhoods in the world; it earned Baltimore its nickname Bodymore, Murderland, and was made notorious by 'The Wire.' Drug deals dominate street corners and ruthless, casual violence abounds.Montana Barronette grew up in the centre of it all. The leader of the gang 'Trained to Go,' or TTG, when he was finally arrested, he had been nicknamed 'Baltimore's Number One Trigger Puller.' Under Tana's reign, TTG dominated Sandtown. When a string of murders were linke...
Ronnie Kray was one half of London's most notorious gangster duo. He and his brother Reggie ruled the East End of the 1950s, and the duo's crimes and vendettas, showdowns and rivalries, have become the stuff of legend. Here, natural raconteur and childhood friend, Laurie O'Leary, recalls the behind-the scenes stories of his wild times in the Kray gang and describes the colourful characters who made up the Krays' ever-changing circle of friends and enemies - from Nipper Read, the man who brought...
The true story of the world’s most prolific art thief, who accumulated a collection worth over $1.4 billion. A spellbinding portrait of obsession and flawed genius, from the bestselling author of The Stranger in the Wood. For centuries, works of art have been stolen in countless ways from all over the world, but no one has been quite as successful at it as the master thief Stéphane Breitwieser. Carrying out more than 200 heists over nearly ten years - in museums and cathedrals all over Europe...
For the right man, all doors are open...Mike Mackenzie is a self-made man with too much time on his hands and a bit of the devil in his soul. He is looking for something to liven up the days and perhaps give new meaning to his existence. A chance encounter at an art auction offers him the opportunity to do just that as he settles on a plot to commit a 'perfect crime'. He intends to rip-off one of the most high-profile targets in the capital - the National Gallery of Scotland. So, together with t...
