Shortly before 7:30 p.m. on the evening of January 17, 1950, a group of armed, masked men emerged from 165 Prince Street in Boston, Massachusetts, dragging bags containing $1,218,211.29 in cash and $1,557,183.83 in checks, money orders, and other securities. These men had just committed the "crime of the century," the "perfect crime," the "fabulous Brink's robbery." At 7:27 p.m. as the robbers sped from the scene, a Brink's employee telephoned the Boston Police Department. Minutes later, police arrived at the Brink's building, and special agents of the FBI quickly joined in the investigation.
At the outset, very few facts were available to the investigators. From interviews with the five employees whom the criminals had confronted, it was learned that between five and seven robbers had entered the building. All of them wore Navy-type peacoats, gloves, and chauffeur's caps. Each robber's face was completely concealed behind a Halloween-type mask. To muffle their footsteps, one of the gang wore crepe-soled shoes, and the others wore rubbers.
The robbers did little talking. They moved with a studied precision which suggested that the crime had been carefully planned and rehearsed in the preceding months. Somehow the criminals had opened at least three—and possibly four—locked doors to gain entrance to the second floor of Brink's, where the five employees were engaged in their nightly chore of checking and storing the money collected from Brink's customers that day.
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