Lufthansa heist

The Lufthansa heist was a robbery which took place at New York City's John F. Kennedy International Airport on December 11, 1978. An estimated US$ 5.875 million (equivalent to US$ 27.6 million in 2023) was stolen, with $5 million in cash and $875,000 in jewelry, making it the largest cash robbery committed on American soil at the time. James Burke, an associate of the Lucchese crime family of New York, was reputed to be the mastermind of the robbery, but was never officially charged in connection with the crime. Burke is also alleged to have either committed or ordered the murders of many co-conspirators in the robbery, both to avoid being implicated in the heist and to keep their shares of the money for himself. The only person convicted in the Lufthansa heist was Louis Werner, an airport worker involved with the planning. The money and jewellery have never been recovered. The heist's magnitude made it one of the longest-investigated crimes in U.S. history; the latest arrest associated with the robbery was made in 2014, which resulted in acquittal. Planning The heist was allegedly planned by James Burke, an associate of the Lucchese crime family of New York City, and was carried out by several associates. The plot began when bookmaker Martin Krugman told Burke's associate, Henry Hill, that the German airline Lufthansa flew in currency to its cargo terminal at John F. Kennedy International Airport. The information had originally come from Louis Werner, an airport worker who owed Krugman $20,000 for gambling debts, and from his co-worker Peter Gruenwald. Werner and Gruenwald had previously been successful in stealing $22,000 in foreign currency from Lufthansa in 1976.