Ask below and we'll reply! WebCampbell made her way back to Charlotte (Ghantt was told by Chambers to head to Atlanta and catch a flight from there), where the money had since been moved into barrels and There was, however, one problem with his plan. After meeting up with Chambers, Campbell, and some other co-conspirators, Ghantt hightailed it to Mexico with $50,000 in cash in his car. You see, theres a reason Loomis Fargo used armored cars to move large amounts of cash. [7][8], Rocket Science, a 1998 double-disc album by Charlotte-based radio personalities John Boy & Billy, includes a track ("Marvin: The Loomis Caper") mocking the defendants. Todd Williamson/Getty ImagesDavid Ghantt attends the 2016 after party for the Hollywood premiere of Masterminds, based on the Loomis Fargo heist that he helped carry out. WebNo products in the cart. Except the person he offered $150,000 to mule $2.5 million down to Ghantt in Mexico turned him down and instead went to the FBI. One number is working in Campbells favor. It affects everybody different. In the wee hours of the morning, Chambers and the Erics drove back to the town of Vale, North Carolina, and holed up in a double-wide trailer while counting their cash. WebLoomis Fargo Robbery There is a vault reserved for only the most outrageous, preposterous, and far-fetched real life stories. I loved it. He was the only employee unaccounted for the next morning, and videotapes recovered at the Loomis Fargo Charlotte office showed Ghantt removing "cubes of cash" and loading it into a Loomis Fargo armored van for over an hour. 6 Is Kelly Campbell married to ghantt? Dozens of FBI agents everywhere. Once the hitman Chambers had hired arrived in Mexico, he found that he couldnt bring himself to kill Ghantt. Michelle, meanwhile, purchased new breasts for herself, along with a $43,000 diamond ring and a new convertible BMW Z3. Most high schools offer a variety of history classes, so make sure youre taking the right ones for you. I work construction. WebGhantt was joking in the breakroom with fellow Loomis Fargo employee Kelly Campbell. Heist: The Oddball Crew behind the $17 Million Loomis Fargo Theft Jeff Diamant 12 Audio CD 9 offers from $5.86 About the Author Jeff Diamant covered the heist for the Charlotte Observer. David Ghantt was the vault supervisor for Loomis, Fargo & Co. armored cars, which managed the transportation of large sums of cash between banks in North Carolina. And going to see the Mayan ruins. Chambers had known enough to insist that no one blows through a ton of cash immediately after the robbery, but once he actually had his hands on the money, he couldnt follow his own advice. 1997 Harley-Davidson Road King motorcycle for sale at auction of items bought after Loomis, Fargo armored car facility heist by Steven Chambers, wife Michele, Kelly Jane Campbell & David Scott Ghanntt (Photo by Will And Deni McIntyre/Getty Images) Ghantt, meanwhile, had spent most of his money at a resort in Cancun, where he was being told he looked a lot like the guy that stole $20 million from a bank. Not only was Ghantt the only unaccounted for employee the morning after the heist, there was also footage of Ghantt moving the cash into the back of the Loomis Fargo van. Galifianakis is game for anything, including eating a dead tarantula (who knew tarantulas were filled with caramel syrup? Its hilarious. the Loomis Fargo heist As it turns out, the heist did in fact go as well as you might expect. Get an all-access pass to never-before-seen content, free digital evidence kits, and much more! I told the lead investigator I was glad to see him.. Thatd be the time to do it, Ghantt recalls. And so, he told her, Google my name. Twenty people were convicted of roles big and small in the massive 1997 armored-car warehouse heist in west Charlotte. Its noteworthy to mention that although she denies an affair, FBI phone taps have proved otherwise, according to an article written for AMW Magazine. On March 1, 1988, Mexican police arrested Ghantt at Playa del Carmen. And with Loomis, were looking at only one case. About 20 ago, Campbell sent him a letter of apology, but he never responded. There was a third person with them, too, a man named Eric Grant. Its really just a matter of timing, more than anything. And she says, How much do you think wed get out of there? I said, Ten to 15 million. But I didnt really know.. The Antwerp diamond heist, dubbed the heist of the century, was by far the largest diamond heist.Antwerp diamond heist. He pocketed the money and told Chambers and Campbell to send him his cut in Mexico. Its easy to get somebody to do something if you know that they are that infatuated with you.. David Ghantt had been a model employee for an armored car company before pulling off This meant a bump in pay, up to $8.15 an hour. Charlotte Agenda is now Axios Charlotte -. Wyatt Redd is a freelance writer from Nashville, Tennessee. But I thought this is me being hard-headed Im going to ride this thing to the ground. And so thats what I did.. Theres less security. Who are the actors in the movie Masterminds? In total, 24 people were convicted and all but one of the I flew from Atlanta to New Orleans. Ghantt and his compatriots, it turns out, had underestimated how bulky money is. Before he decided to steal $17 million from the bank, Ghantt had worked for years as a relatively taciturn and compliant employee. I started just chucking it as fast as I could, he said, adding the sweat was pouring off of me.. His collection case closes in two years. Federal law stops government collection efforts 20 years after a defendant leaves prison. But because he still owes millions to the IRS, he couldnt be paid. A painting dubbed Velvet Elvis, which came out of the Cramer Mountain mansion owned by Steve Chambers, became notorious in the case. Campbell left her job in the summer of 1997, but she would later use Ghantts feelings for her to her own advantage to get him to agree to carry out the multi-million-dollar heist. Get all your true crime news from Oxygen. He was like OK, yeah, we can do that, she recalled. $17.3 million in cash was robbed from the Charlotte, North Carolina, regional office vault of Loomis, Fargo & Co. on the evening of October 4, 1997. More than 2 million dollars is still missing to this day. But first they wanted to know if it was a robbery or a robbery-homicide. I was working all the time and unhappy I felt cornered and one day the joking in the break room about robbing the place suddenly didnt seem so far-fetched.. ACT Writing: 15 Tips to Raise Your Essay Score, How to Get Into Harvard and the Ivy League, Is the ACT easier than the SAT? [citation needed], It was later confirmed by the FBI that more than 88% of the stolen cash had been located or otherwise accounted for. In August 1997, Campbell informed Ghantt of an old high school friend of hers, Steve Chambers, who could assist Ghantt in executing a massive cash robbery of the Loomis Fargo vault in one night. A comedy film called Masterminds, based on the Loomis Fargo heist and starring Zach Galifianakis, Kristen Wiig, Owen Wilson, and Jason Sudeikis, was released in 2016. Why do we feel its so necessary to treat people like this, to say, OK, well just ruin the rest of your life because you made a bad decision., Punishment should not last a lifetime. Restitution is a familiar part of sentencing in federal court. WebTo that end, Campbell brought in her childhood friend Steve Chambers, who was characterized in the local press as a small-time drug dealer and a local fence for stolen They also bought a BMW Z3 with cash and made several large purchases, including a $600 cigar store Indian. Pocketing $50,000 for himself, that man, named David Ghantt, hopped into a car of his own and headed towards Mexico. While listening in, they uncovered another more sinister alleged plan to kill Ghantt. The College Entrance Examination BoardTM does not endorse, nor is it affiliated in any way with the owner or any content of this site. The FBI quickly connected Ghantt to Campbell, who was a former Loomis Fargo employee. He was also a former FBI informant who had tipped the bureau off to a planned robbery of a Loomis Fargo armored truck that never came to fruition. White-collar criminals are pretty good at hiding their money, she said. Some of that money is just gone. And thats OK with Ghantt, whos just a few weeks shy of his 47th birthday, out of federal prison for more than a decade, married with a 9-year-old daughter and happy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LCR9zyGkbo. Ghantt worked at Loomis Fargos regional office vault in Charlotte. All but one of the defendants pleaded guilty. Was Loomis Fargo heist real? Given his position at the bank, hed be the one to pull off the robbery, and he intended to be ready. Eventually, Ghantt would return to the United States and the full sum would be split up between the conspirators. He was also married. 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. This robbery was the second-largest cash robbery on U.S. soil at the time, as only seven months earlier, on March 29, 1997 in Jacksonville, Florida, Phillip Noel Johnson stole $18.8 million from the Loomis Fargo armored vehicle he was driving.October 1997 Loomis Fargo robbery. Soon thereafter, he met Kelly Campbell, a co-worker at Loomis Fargo. A report by the General Accounting Office found that as of budget year 2016, $110 billion in restitution ordered by the federal courts was outstanding and that more than 90% of the amount had been classified as uncollectible.. Who pulled off the biggest heist in history? Then, I started loading the van., Money, when bound in bulk and stacked in canvas bags, is heavier than you might expect. His partners, who planned to stay behind, agreed to send him his full cut of the money after the heat from investigators had died down. His name was Corey. Is the movie Masterminds based on a true story? At the time of the real robbery, Chambers was facing criminal charges hed written 30K worth of bad checks and was facing jail time for it. 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. Naturally, Ghantt started to run out of cash and turned to Chambers, who was annoyed by his requests for more money. Ghantt's spending in Mexico was extravagant at first. Two days after the heist, the FBI found the missing van with $3.3 million of cash left in it. Florida Gov. He comes to my door, and hes got a brown paper bag in his hand. All of the defendants except for one pleaded guilty and accepted their sentences. Then Michele made a trip to the bank. The plan was to split the money three ways: Chambers, Campbell and Ghantt would each walk away with what Ghantt estimated to be $5 million a piece the kind of money that changes lives forever. The move bought him a little extra time to make his escape. The money was successfully handed off, and Ghantt and Campbellmade their way to the Columbia airport with $50,000 and an intent to make it to Mexico by the next day, where the two would hide out while Chambers took care of things in Charlotte until it was safe to come back. WebThis real-life . After his release, Ghantt took a job as a construction worker and was eventually brought on as a consultant for the 2016 movie Masterminds, based on the Loomis Fargo Heist. And so this third camera caught everything that happened next. All rights reserved. Meanwhile, back in North Carolina, Ghantts wife woke up to find her husband missing. You cannot fine low-income people millions of dollars. Ghantt would go on to spend six and a half years in federal prison. Web>> PHOTOS: The Loomis Fargo heist, 25 years later Ghantt, his former co-worker Kelly Campbell and her friends Steve and Michelle Chambers, carried out the Loomis Fargo Going south, nobody really looks at what youre shipping. ", After successfully tracing Ghantt's phone call, FBI agents coordinated with Mexican police to arrest Ghantt on March 1, 1998, at Playa del Carmen, a city near Cancun. I hear her typing. Create your free profile and get access to exclusive content. What ACT target score should you be aiming for? See how other students and parents are navigating high school, college, and the college admissions process. Chambers had broached the possibility of a robbery to Campbell earlier in the summer. Because the money in the vault was largely from banks, the crime was technically a bank robbery and thus a federal offense. Twenty-one people were charged and convicted in the robbery, one of the biggest heists in U.S. history. I was working sometimes 75-80 hours a week at $8.15 an hour. Punishment needs to be fair and realistic. David Ghantt had been a model employee for an armored car company before pulling off the second biggest cash heist in U.S. history, fleeing with more than $17 million in untraceable bills in 1997. Ghantt has never explained where that money went. Officials suspected that the extravagant purchases stemmed from the fact that all involved got far more money than they anticipated and literally didnt know how to spend or get rid of it, which is perhaps backed up by the fact that Chambers wife once walked into a Belmont Wachovia with $200,000 in a briefcase wanting to know how much she could deposit without the bank reporting it to officials. Tags: Associated Press, courts, crime, North Carolina. Inside were, along with other personal items, his keys and wedding ring. You can read more at, Dilworth Coffee is coming to the Fifth Third Center. I knew that if we could stay off the radar for about a year, we could basically live a vacation life, Ghantt said. Thats pretty standard in restitution matters. He was released in 2006. The pal part is true: The real amateur killer Chambers sent couldnt pull off the crime after traveling to Mexico. An FBI criminal investigation ultimately resulted in the arrest and conviction of eight people directly involved in the heist, as well as sixteen others who had indirectly helped them, and the recovery of approximately 88% of the stolen money. Time passed, and Campbell eventually quit her job at Loomis Fargo. Ghantts accomplices soon showed up but now they had another problem. By comparison, Ghantt served seven years in prison and was fined $26,000. Loomis Fargo employees could not open the vault the next morning and called the police. When I call Ghantt to discuss his involvement in the Loomis Fargo heist, he confesses that hes feeling a bit tired from a day of honest labor. While Ghantt moved to Mexico to let things cool down after the heist, his robbery cohorts stayed in North Carolina with the bulk of the money. But of course, then they had to decorate that spectacular new space and so they spent tens of thousands of dollars on things like cigar store Indians, paintings of Elvis, and a bulldog dressed up like George Patton. One day, the two employees were in the break room and got to talking about the news of the day a massive bank heist that just occurred in Florida by someone at their company. The pair began to daydream about whether they could really pull off the heist. Michelle Chambers received seven years and eight months, while Steve Chambers was handed an 11-year sentence. It was nearly the perfect crime, but while Ghantt fled to Mexico to lay low, his partners lavish spendingand their own alleged plans for murderwould ultimately be the groups demise. And Ghantt hadnt really thought about the physical challenge of moving such a large sum of money. Nine other relatives and friends were also charged with money laundering, as they had co-signed for safe deposit boxes used to store some of the money; prosecutors opted to charge them on the grounds that they should have known the money was obtained illegally. Things were spiraling fast. the Loomis heist celebrates its 25th birthday. Then check out another bank robber who inspired a movie, John Wojtowicz. Youre supposed to get less time for cooperating, a lesser penalty, and instead, you see what she got hit with. Gronquist said. While making only eight dollars an hour in his role as supervisor, Ghantt decided it was time to do something: I was unhappy with my life. Lindy Hop: The Dance That Defined The Golden Age of Jazz, Inside The Unsolved Disappearance Of Jennifer Kesse, What Stephen Hawking Thinks Threatens Humankind The Most, 27 Raw Images Of When Punk Ruled New York, Join The All That's Interesting Weekly Dispatch, David Ghantt attends the 2016 after party for the Hollywood premiere of. When she was a teacher, Hayley's students regularly scored in the 99th percentile thanks to her passion for making topics digestible and accessible. But it was the rural, Southern backgrounds of many of the key players, along with the many botched twists and bungled turns, that led the media to dub it the hillbilly heist.. When Ghantt called Chambers to have the latter wire him more money, Chambers sent just a few thousand dollars. Hello, federal suspicious activity report. Cool, I say. WebThe Loomis Fargo Bank Robbery was the $17.3 million cash robbery of the Charlotte, North Carolina, regional office vault of Loomis Fargo & Company on the evening of I just had to call you., Today, Ghantt cant look back on the whole ordeal without some degree of pride. The U.S. Now, I kind of know something is fishy., Alone in Mexico with limited cash, Ghantt thought about turning himself in. His new life in Mexico had begun. They called the police, who brought in the FBI, classifying the heist as a bank robbery. It all went down in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the man at the center of that heist, David Scott Ghantt, now lives in Jacksonville. Campbell, for her part, bought a Toyota van in two installments. WebCampbell was another employee at Loomis Fargo and she and Ghantt quickly struck up a relationship, one that Campbell denies was ever romantic though FBI evidence says Either way, intothe picture walks Steve Chambers and a group of friends that would set the plan in motion. Check out never-before-seen content, free digital evidence kits, and much more! Down in Jacksonville, a Loomis Fargo employee took $18 million from an armored van he was driving. They kept several furnishings from the previous owners, including a painting of Elvis Presley on black velvet. Zaron Burnett is an investigative journalist and longform features writer based in Los Angeles. The Loomis case is another example where the amount of restitution ordered vs. what is actually paid are two dramatically different numbers. All rights reserved. The leader was Allen Pace, who turned out to be the worst safety inspector the Dunbar Armored trucking company ever employed. Campbell used part of her share of the money to buy a Toyota Sienna minivan in two cash installments. They also left behind a life-changing fortune in small bills $3.3 million in fives and ones that they overlooked and the two videotapes that Ghantt had pulled from the security cameras at the bank. real kelly campbell loomis fargo heist. From the beginning, the FBIs prime suspect was David Ghantt. Thomas Grant, who served three years in prison for bank larceny, paid off restitution of $70,000; brother Eric Grant paid all of his $26,000; as did David Craig, $40,000; and Dennis and Sandra Floyd; $27,000. If you want me to leave, Ill leave. Then, Ghantt went into another room. At 6:40 p.m., he headed to his car along with three other employees before returning to the depository, where hed propped open the door. This is the person I counted as my friend. Or as he tells me, How many people in the United States havent thought about robbing a bank? Criminals dont usually get high-paying jobs after leaving prison. From going fishing to riding horses on the beach the whole nine yards. Ghantt spent a solid hour moving what ended up being 2,700 pounds of cash more than an actual ton into an unmarked company van. Loomis Fargo Defendants Owe as Much as They Stole in 1997, FILE - Kelly Campbell, one of the 21 people convicted for their involvement in the $17 million Loomis Fargo heist, awaits sentencing for her part in the theft at her mobile home near Mount Holly, N.C. on Aug 16, 1999. I knew it was over then, Ghantt said. Besides her prison sentence, Campbell must undergo mental health and drug treatment and spend two years in a supervised release program. WebAydin Properties > Uncategorized > real kelly campbell loomis fargo heist. I knew that if I did something like that, I would take a huge amount of money, Ghantt said of the brash robbery on an upcoming episode of, To find out more about how the thieves got caught and how long they landed behind bars, tune in the. Paying the money back has taken a lot longer, and time is running out for the U.S. government to collect. An inept hitman was sent to kill David Ghantt. Fourteen defendants were ordered to make restitution payments to Loomis Fargo totaling almost $19 million. Generally, the events of the film are fairly close to reality when they follow the broad details of the case. The next morning, Loomis Fargo employees were unable to open the vault. Its kind of out of sight, out of mind, she said of the reasoning. There was also no dramatic showdown between Chambers and Ghantt as the movie suggests. Eric Payne got out of prison in 2006 for his role in the heist and has since paid $11,357 on his $292,000 debt. When asked what the dumbest thing was that Ghantt spent money on, he admitted: The 4 pairs of boots I bought in one day [shrug] what can I say they were nice and I was impulse shopping.. Ghantt started at Loomis Fargo in 1994, and soon worked his way up from an armored car driver to a vault supervisor. An additional tip reached the FBI when Michelle Chambers made a large deposit at a bank. The True Story of David Ghantt and the Loomis Fargo Heist, Get Free Guides to Boost Your SAT/ACT Score, check out some of these books on our AP History Exam reading list. Theres no way to get it back, Butcher told The Charlotte Observer. [1], This robbery was the second-largest cash robbery on U.S. soil at the time, as only seven months earlier, on March 29, 1997 in Jacksonville, Florida, Philip Noel Johnson stole $18.8 million from the Loomis Fargo armored vehicle he was driving.[2]. Campbell was receptive and brought the idea up to Ghantt. [citation needed], The defendants were the targets of many barbed jokes in Charlotte and across the country, in part because of their extravagant spending. He says the Loomis case shows how the criminal justice system and the courts treat lower-income people differently. On Oct. 5, the Loomis heist celebrates its 25th birthday. According to Butcher, Campbells last official payment came in June 2021 when the government appears to have seized a tax refund of $81.24. Did you know that the SAT offers subject exams, too? Then, keeping with the plan, Ghantt took $50,000 (the maximum that could by law be taken across the border without further authorization) with him and left for Mexico, winding up at the popular Yucatan Peninsula resort-island of Cozumel. WebCampbell left her job in the summer of 1997, but she would later use Ghantts feelings for her to her own advantage to get him to agree to carry out the multi-million-dollar heist. She laughed for like 45 minutes. Michele Chambers 1998 BMW for sale following the prosecutions of the Loomis Fargo heist conspirators. So Chambers decided to solve the problem by putting a hit on Ghantt. He and his wife, Michelle, moved from their mobile home in Lincoln County to a luxury house in the wealthy Cramer Mountain section of Cramerton. WebHolding her hands behind her back, Michele Chambers was sentenced Tuesday to seven years and eight months in prison for her role in the $17 million heist from Loomis, Fargo Eight people were indicted for bank larceny and money laundering,whichnine friends and relatives were also charged for, as theyd co-signed safe deposit boxes to store some of the cash. The first is that this was the same year, 1997, that the largest cash robbery in history took place within the same company. Ghantt reported to Chambers that his supply of money was running low, but Chambers sent Ghantt just $8,000. He stayed at a luxury hotel and took scuba diving lesson. She wondered how much she could deposit without attracting the attention of the FBI, so she decided to just ask the teller: How much can I deposit before you have to report it to the feds? she asked. In fact, David Ghantt was about to commit the heist of a lifetime. I didnt even know about it and overlooked it, he said. When he was done, the man drove off to a nearby printing press, where the money was distributed into private vehicles amongst a handful of people. Until, that is, he decided to hell with it he was going to pull-off the second largest heist in U.S. history. Just head on out. And so, he did. "Wells Fargo and Loomis forming armored car company", Learn how and when to remove this template message, painting of Elvis Presley on black velvet, "FindACase | United States of America v. Steven Eugene Chambers", "The Unperfect Crime | New Dominion Pictures", "Sunday Evening/Late Night September 9, 2001", "Loomis Fargo heist: Q&A with guy who stole $17 million", "MASTERMINDS - Movie Production NotesCinemaReview.com", Ghantt and other gang members arrested in March 1998, Steven Chambers released from prison; announces he is a "retired criminal", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=October_1997_Loomis_Fargo_robbery&oldid=1132065054, Articles with dead external links from February 2020, Articles needing additional references from October 2019, All articles needing additional references, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles needing additional references from February 2020, Articles with unsourced statements from February 2020, Articles with dead external links from July 2022, Articles with permanently dead external links, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Overcoming the mindset that led to the part David Ghantt played in the Loomis robbery and how he started on a new path was the subject of the book, Within days of the robbery, the case was depicted on the television criminal reporting show, An expanded two-hour special episode of the crime documentary series. She was like, Well, at least you had guts, he says. Im on the phone with Kelly [Campbell], and Im like, Hey, I really was expecting a package to arrive. The whole town I was staying in was 98.9 percent Mexican, except for when the cruise ships were in, Ghantt recalls. Check out our top-rated graduate blogs here: PrepScholar 2013-2018. This is where it starts to unravel, Ghantt tells me with a wry laugh. Ghantt and Campbell couldnt get to Mexico from Columbia, as there were no international flights being offered out of the hub, which they would have known, had they called ahead. One day, Campbell was speaking to an old friend named Steve Chambers. 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.

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