The Gold by Neil Forsyth and Thomas Turner

The Gold by Neil Forsyth and Thomas Turner is the real story behind Brink’s-Mat, Britain’s biggest ever heist. The Brink’s-Mat gold robbery took place in November 1983. It is a phrase that is stuck in my head from childhood, but I was too young to really know anything about it.

I recently watched The Gold, a dramatisation of the events of Brink’s-Mat, on iPlayer (it’s very good, I recommend you watch it!), so was inspired to read the book. Thomas Turner, one of the authors of the book, was also the researcher for The Gold on TV.

This really is an incredible book, based on an incredible crime. A lot of the time I felt like I was reading a Rebus novel, but it is something which actually happened. It was a crime on a scale never seen before and needed a different type of policing never seen before.

On 26th November, 1983, six armed robbers broke into the Brink’s-Mat depot near Heathrow Airport and got away with nearly £26 million in gold. It was more than they ever expected to get away with. And disposing of £26 million of gold is really difficult…

There began a complicated chain of smelting gold and money laundering, involving some of London’s biggest criminals, as well as some enthusiastic amateurs, and lasting for many years. It’s believed that the final death related to Brink’s-Mat happened as recently as 2015.

This is the most comprehensive book to date around the robbery, the disposal of the gold and the police investigation. But nobody really knows everything that happened, least of all those involved. Many of those strongly believed to have been involved escaped justice, with just two of the robbers actually convicted of the crime.

There is a lot of detail in The Gold about the police investigation, which feels very shoddy by today’s standards. Interviews weren’t recorded and solicitors weren’t required to be in the interviews. The criminals suggested that the police were falsifying evidence, which in some cases they might have been. Police corruption was rife in the 1980s.

If you’ve watched The Gold, this gives more detail. Some of the characters in the TV show weren’t real, but they were based on real people involved. If it got you interested in the crime, this is a must-read. Or if you’re a fan of crime fiction, The Gold is very similar! It is well worth a read.