About 3,600 Apple iPad Minis were stolen Monday from the same JFK Airport warehouse in which the infamous Lufthansa Heist took place nearly 34 years ago.
Two men entered JFK’s Building 261 and loaded two pallets of brand new iPads onto a tractor trailer using the warehouse’s own forklift, the New York Post reported. The men fled when an employee spotted them, leaving three additional pallets behind.
Building 261 was the home of Lufthansa Cargo in 1978 when a gang of Luchese crime family associates led by Henry Hill and Jimmy Burke stole over $5 million in currency and jewels, which remains the largest cash theft in the US history. The plot was one a key plot element in the classic Martin Scorcese film, Goodfellas.
(Here’s an awesome site detailing the history of Building 261, which was state-of-the-art when Lufthansa built it in the early 1970s to accomodate their new 747 Freighters. Lufthansa moved to another building in 2001.)
Authorities seem to think it was an inside job but have not yet identified any suspects.
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UPDATE SATURDAY 1:00 PM ET: The FBI has arrested Renel Rene Richardson, an employee of Cargo Air Services which operates the warehouse from which the iPads are stolen. Richardson allegedly made suspicious inquiries about the shipment and the location of forklifts in the days leading up to the theft. He was helping law enforcement locate the truck, but it was not clear if the iPads had been recovered.
