Bungling armed robbers botched their raid on a cash van by blowing up the entire haul.
Instead of blasting the doors off, the 20 balaclava-wearing gangsters carrying AK47 assault rifles and revolvers blew off the roof and both sides. The force of the detonation was so massive the Fidelity Group Services armoured truck was blown in half and much of the money inside was blasted hundreds of feet up into the air.
The gang in bulletproof vests grabbed what intact money cases they could and fled in their ultra-lux cars from the scene in Mhala, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa. Locals immediately ran from their houses and stopped their cars to fill their pockets with hundreds of pounds worth of loot.
A small fortune in Rands in the red, blue, pink, brown and green bank notes of South Africa were still fluttering to the ground or blowing in the breeze sparking a cash free-for-all for locals. A witness told local media: “Whenever there is a huge bang we know it is a cash-in-transit robbery and if we are lucky there is a lot of money left behind before the police get here”.
On Saturday, Fidelity armoured truck was being escorted by a Toyota Hilux armoured station wagon, which had collected cash from stores in the town of Thulamashe. At around 4pm, two VW polos attacked the escort vehicle with automatic fire as it was being transported to the local Fidelity depot. The cash van was then forced off the road and a Mercedes sedan rammed the armoured car. In fear of getting blown up as well, the guards in the van were disarmed and abandoned the vehicle as one of the criminals attached the explosives.
The unnamed witness said: “The bang was massive and when the dust settled the truck wasn’t there anymore but it was in two bits and the sky was full of bank notes raining down. The robbers seemed unsure what to do but grabbed some grey looking boxes that seemed to be intact and then raced off towards Dwarsloops and then all the locals rushed down there. How much was left behind I don’t know but everybody seemed very excited and were grabbing handfuls and handfuls until they heard the sirens and everyone then disappeared."
A case docket for a cash-in-transit robbery, attempted murder and armed robbery was registered for further investigation. South African Police spokesman captain Dineo Lucy Sekgotodi confirmed: “The local community descended on the crime scene and looted the remainder of the loose money scattered about. We urge people never to do this as it can contaminate the crime scene and there can still be explosives that have not detonated that can go off and injure them as they collect the money”.
The SAPS officer confirmed a guard in the escort vehicle suffered gunshot wounds and was taken to hospital. The disarmed guards were not hurt, she added. The 20 heavily-armed suspects were said to be wearing balaclavas and speaking in Zulu. At a previous conference Fidelity’s head of security Wahl Bartmann said of the cash-in-transit gangs: “They are like a terrorist group very military organised and execute their plans well”. Fifteen of the company’s guards are killed on average a year by cash-in-transit robbers, he said.