Some lessons here:

 Read all about how some Britons stole some 1.5 MILLION British pounds.....(And got caught)


First of all, an ingenious method of making small contained explosions. With legally (and easily accessible) components. (I remember making such explosions with 55 gallon trash bags...it went well until we added hydrogen to the mix, but that is another story for another time.....) These components are fairly easy to transport and to mix and detonate... A handy bit of knowledge if and when you need something like that......I might also point out that there are other gasses (commonly available) that could be used with perhaps less effective  (but effective enough!) results.


But the biggest lesson here is HOW the police caught the thieves: Cell phone tracking via the cell sites and license plate tracking........

While I have no intention of breaking into ATM's nor robbing banks, I found the story nonetheless interesting......There are lessons here for those of us who believe that someday we might need to protest our government rather more... vigorously.... than blogging and facebook. More...direct action shall we say?  

Now, I've written before how, if you are stupid, you can easily be tracked with that small box you carry around in your pocket (or purse, if you are a lady). I've written before how you can avoid that using a burner phone from Walmart or other retailer, and how even that can be a trap if you aren't careful. Tracking via cell phones was one of the ways that the British Police found the men, and even more so, found that they were gathering together. Add in license plate tracking and scanning and you had a recipe for incarceration. (and, lets face it, these men had a history of crime which put them at the top of the list when cell phone records were tracked). Simply leaving their cell phones at home might well have made it impossible for the police to track them. If they needed communications, cheap disposable phones would have sufficed (had they used proper security (see the linked articles)) and once the job or jobs were done said phones were easily disposed of afterwards, leaving no traces as to who had been where........and who had called whom.

Please note: I am not advocating that you go and buy a tank of acetylene or propane and blow open any ATM's. Nope, not at all. But I am suggesting that you might want to learn from these men, both their successes AND their mistakes. Should the time come when you want or need to emulate some of their tactics, perhaps in opposition to your government..... you might not want to also emulate their mistakes......




HT: Irons in the Fire