# Super Criminals **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 10, 2012, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416 "2012-02-10T15:20:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2012, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/21 "2012-02-11T16:22:44Z")
> [@pdunderhill](#): > > I’d always thought that crime and the acquisition of money per se, once sucsess is reached, tend to become boring. The Game becomes everything. > Thieves become dictators/politicians/Bankers, Hitler anyone? > Drug dealers see above. > So, in answer, the most sucsessful criminals have that skill-set amongst many others and would probably appear as very high/over acheivers in many other fields. > Just my DAG! > Peter As I said - I doubt there’s enough money in theivery to sustain itself in a decent lifestyle. You hits either are so numerous or so spectacularly big that you will very quickly get caught. Very few criminal enterprises provide the large regular income that the drug trade appears to. Someone like Hitler was not a crook. (..thinking “I am not a crook!” …shake jowls.) He was a fanatic who wanted to take his country in a particular direction. He did not appear to live the high life like Saddam Hussein or Ghaddafi or Marcos. However, those were not crooks either. They started off as standard army officers or politicians, and simply enjoyed the same perks of office that anyone else in that position in those countries would aspire too. Their skill-set would not be ability to plan heists or such; instead it’s leadership, and a ruthlessness to bump off whoever’s in their way or presents a threat. ---
**Author:** ![pdunderhill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4bbf92/32.png) [@pdunderhill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pdunderhill)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2012, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/22 "2012-02-11T17:33:43Z")
Yes thanks MD2000, I’d posit that the third reich, doesn’t deserve capitalization, was probably the largest criminal enterprise ever undertaken, Supertramp called WW2 ‘the Crime of the Century’ and if you consider them as cultural observers rather than ‘just’ another bunch of musicians they have a point. It’s the oldest battle between an individuals altruism versus their selfishness. Altruistic criminals or thieves, if that’s not a contra-indication in terms, can become bandits, folk heroes or rule a country, the Borgias and Sforzas come to mind. Before anyone trys to ask me to ‘cite’ I went to School, Downside School, Somerset UK, with one of the Sforza scions and a very, _very_ nasty piece of work he was, familial brutishness. IMHO criminality is an approach to society, we all have it. If you are poor and find a substantial amount of money on the street do you aveil yourself of it? Conversely do you always give your last coin to some one who’s needs are greater than yours. Personally, I, like most of us c.6,000,000,000 live in the vast morrass of grey morality. The idea of the company of _any_form of extremist behaviour, by any definition leaves me cold. And the Cat seconds me! Peter, London is cold brrrgh. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/23 "2012-02-11T19:37:31Z")
OK. Not every crime is theivery. In fact, murder is worse. I’ll posit that murder in the name of an ideal is so twisted it is a much worser crime. Of all the horrible things we think of the nazis, living the high life like byzantine emperors with a dozen palaces adorned with gold bathroom fixtures, consuming sumptious 10-course meals, all the women you want and total decadence is not what comes to mind. But of course, that is what makes it so much more incomprehensible. The Crime of the Century was not theft, even though there was a bit of that. To get back to the OP, the real “mastermind” also understands how to stay under the radar. Like the drug kingpins, a theft ring would have to stay under the radar but do enough work to pay all the bills. That means, like the drug system, farming out smaller less noticeable jobs to a large array of underlings sufficiently removed from the top that they can’t finger the leader in court. The really big offenses that make headlines guarantee the police will spare no effort to catch the perps. ---
**Author:** ![DrForrester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8edcca/32.png) [@DrForrester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrForrester)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2012, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/24 "2012-02-11T20:05:20Z")
Speaking of how difficult it would be to finance a luxurious lifestyle on a career in crime, especially a crime that required skill rather than luck, it may not be entirely inappropriate to mention Richard Kuklinski - > **[Richard Kuklinski](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Kuklinski)** > > Richard Leonard Kuklinski (/kʊˈklɪnski/; April 11, 1935 – March 5, 2006), also known as "The Iceman", was an American criminal and convicted murderer. Kuklinski was engaged in criminal activities for most of his adult life; he ran a burglary ring and distributed pirated pornography. He committed at least five murders between 1980 and 1984. Prosecutors described him as someone who killed for profit. Kuklinski lived with his wife and children in the New Jersey suburb of Dumont. They knew him as Although he didn’t live in opulence, he did pave his way in life (for decades) using crime and skill. He didn’t sit at the top of a crime pyramid & collect from an army beneath him. Still, he’s not really the invisible art thief who prowls Europe with a bag of tricks. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2012, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/25 "2012-02-11T20:24:16Z")
There are a couple of stories that kinda sorta match the supercriminal “big heist” archetype: the [Banco Central burglary at Fortaleza](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banco_Central_burglary_at_Fortaleza) in Brazil and the [Knightsbridge Security Deposit robbery](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knightsbridge_Security_Deposit_robbery) in London. There’s one other I’m trying to think of involving tunnelling into a bank similar to the Banco Central burglary; I’m trying to think it happened in Britain and involved a huge amount of cash and jewels, but I’m drawing a blank and can’t find it on google. Wikipedia also mentions the theft of almost a billion dollars from the Bank of Iran, but i’m not sure that counts, since that was basically Qusay Hussein backing up a couple of trucks and ordering them filled. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2012, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/26 "2012-02-11T20:29:32Z")
> [@DrForrester](#): > > Are there high-end merchandise thefts - large amounts of currency, jewelry, paintings, etc - that are more than the usual “smash & grab” operations that are popularly reported? Art robberies, specially from churches or from people who’ve obtained the object through long inheritance rather than museums, seem to involve very little smashing - it’s more of a “grab and run”. The problem in those, from what the news says (I don’t trust newscasters any further than I can throw them, but I don’t have a better source) is figuring out who may want the items. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2012, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/27 "2012-02-11T21:24:28Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > There are a couple of stories that kinda sorta match the supercriminal “big heist” archetype: the [Banco Central burglary at Fortaleza](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banco_Central_burglary_at_Fortaleza) in Brazil and the [Knightsbridge Security Deposit robbery](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knightsbridge_Security_Deposit_robbery) in London. There’s one other I’m trying to think of involving tunnelling into a bank similar to the Banco Central burglary; I’m trying to think it happened in Britain and involved a huge amount of cash and jewels, but I’m drawing a blank and can’t find it on google. Wikipedia also mentions the theft of almost a billion dollars from the Bank of Iran, but i’m not sure that counts, since that was basically Qusay Hussein backing up a couple of trucks and ordering them filled. There’s the burglary in Marseilles, IIRC, where the safe deposit box vault did not have a motion detector; the theives tunnelled in from the sewers and spent all weekend opening boxes. But from what I heard about it, it was also a bunch of small time crooks who came up with one good big job. Perhaps you’re thinking of Jason Statham’s The Bank Job, allegedly based on a real story about someone doing the same sort of job as Marseilles to retreive royal blackmail pics while doing a safe deposit box robbery. Not sure how much that is based on a real incident. There were some spectacular thefdts like the bullion from Heathrow(?) IIRC - again, allegedly a bunch of crooks who lucked onto one good heist. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2012, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/28 "2012-02-12T02:11:11Z")
> [@dracoi](#): > > … > So, again, it’s more an issue of _proximity and interconnection_ than of being a “super-criminal” with special skills. [ital. added] _Hannibal Lecter:_ …What is the first and principal thing he does? What needs does he serve by killing? _Clarice Starling_: Anger, um, social acceptance, and, huh, sexual frustrations, sir… _Hannibal Lecter:_ No! He covets. That is his nature. And how do we begin to covet, Clarice? Do we seek out things to covet? Make an effort to answer now. _Clarice Starling_: No. We just… _Hannibal Lecter_: No. We begin by coveting what we see every day… ---
**Author:** ![PaulParkhead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@PaulParkhead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PaulParkhead)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2012, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/29 "2012-02-12T02:45:37Z")
> [@md2000](#): > > There were some spectacular thefdts like the bullion from Heathrow(?) IIRC - again, allegedly a bunch of crooks who lucked onto one good heist. Perhaps the [Brinks-MAT](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brink's-MAT_robbery) robbery? ---
**Author:** ![tellyworth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@tellyworth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tellyworth)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2012, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/30 "2012-02-12T06:41:36Z")
[This story](http://www.wired.com/politics/law/magazine/17-04/ff_diamonds?currentPage=all) about a 2003 theft from the Antwerp Diamond Center is rather good. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2012, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/31 "2012-02-12T21:21:19Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > If the police had a short-list of master criminals that they knew who they were, why aren’t they already arrested? They knew who Al Capone was, it took years before they had any solid evidence against him. ---
**Author:** ![MikeS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MikeS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeS)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2012, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/32 "2012-02-13T17:33:23Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > Wikipedia also mentions the theft of almost a billion dollars from the Bank of Iran, but i’m not sure that counts, since that was basically Qusay Hussein backing up a couple of trucks and ordering them filled. \ If Qusay Hussein had managed to rob the Bank of Iran, despite the animosity between their respective countries, it would have been pretty impressive indeed. \ ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2012, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/33 "2012-02-13T18:33:14Z")
> [@DrForrester](#): > > I once saw a documentary about a master thief (Steve Blumberg - I’m pretty sure I am remembering the name). He stole books. He was the son of a rich family. He was never employed in the traditional sense. He bought a house in Iowa (I believe) because it was centrally located within the US. He stole books from lots & lots of university collections. The documentary said that he used elevator shafts and air ducts to move past many security features. > > One main reason that he was able to get away with his crimes for many, many years was that he never sold a book. After his eventual capture, the police found that his house was FULL of books. Not so much a thief as a trust fund kid with an illegal hobby. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![EdwardLost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bbe5ce/32.png) [@EdwardLost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EdwardLost)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2012, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416/34 "2012-02-13T19:34:30Z")
A crime that does require special skills is forgery. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a short list of known master forgers for particular types of art and documents. By the time the crime is discovered the suspect may be long dead. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/super-criminals/612416.md?page=1)