Diamond heist compared to Ocean's Eleven could be perfect crime as 22 suspects acquitted

A diamond heist which took place at an airport a decade ago could be considered a perfect crime as 22 suspects in the case have all been acquitted.

The dramatic events went down in 2013, when eight robbers dressed as police officers and cut through security fences at Brussels international airport, where they made their way in a Mercedes van and a car to a plane bound for Switzerland.

Meanwhile, parcels full of diamonds from the nearby Antwerp global diamond hub were being loaded on to that same plane, which also had 29 passengers on board.

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The robbers threatened pilots and transport security officials with machine guns before loading dozens of the parcels from the plane's hold into their cars, getting away with what was valued at the time to be approximately $50 million (£42m) worth of diamonds.

No one was hurt, and the passengers were none the wiser to the crime taking place around them until they were told to disembark the aircraft because the flight had been cancelled.

The entire heist took less than five minutes, leading many to believe the robbers must have had help from inside the airport.

The criminals fled into the night, and the van which was thought to have been used in the raid was later found burnt out just outside Brussels.

It all seemed so flawless that members of the public compared the events to the 2001 movie Ocean's Eleven, when thieves plot to rob three Las Vegas casinos simultaneously.

@zackmirons/Twitter

"The diamond heist at Brussels airport reminds me of Oceans 11 CRAZY!" one person wrote, while another tweeted: "This diamond heist in Brussels was Oceans 11 status. Well played."

For the next 10 years, the case has largely remained unsolved, despite investigators thinking several times that they were close to finding the robbers.

Defense lawyer Benjamine Bovy has spoken about the inability to track down those responsible, saying: “There were so many elements that were presented as overwhelming evidence, but after a close look appeared to be deformed, and badly interpreted. The mountain gave birth to a mouse."

Belga News Agency / Alamy Stock Photo

Authorities managed to recover some of the diamonds three months after the theft first went down, but the rest are still missing. They also succeeded in convicting one person in relation to the heist, but out of 22 others who have been named as suspects, not one has been proven guilty.

In 2018, 18 people faced court in Brussels on suspicion of their involvement in the crime. The main suspects faced up to eight years in prison, but all 18 were acquitted.

Today (8 March), four more suspects were acquitted on appeal.

Announcing its decision to acquit the suspects, the Brussels appeals court said 'the elements of the investigation are not sufficiently reliable' to convict the last four defendants in the case.