March 1997 Loomis Fargo robbery

Philip Noel Johnson (born 1964)[1] is a former armored car driver employed by Loomis Fargo & Company[2] in Jacksonville, Florida. He is notable for the theft of 18.8 million dollars, at the time the largest heist ever pulled off.

Not to be confused with the October 1997 Loomis Fargo robbery.
March 1997 Loomis Fargo robbery
DateMarch 29, 1997 (1997-03-29)
LocationJacksonville, Florida
TypeBank robbery
MotiveTheft of $18.8 million
TargetLoomis Fargo & Company
ConvictedPhilip Noel Johnson
Sentence25 years imprisonment

Robbery

On March 29, 1997, Johnson pulled off what was then the largest cash heist in U.S. history,[2] taking $18.8 million ($29.2 million today) from the armored vehicle he was driving. Johnson overpowered two of his co-workers and left them handcuffed in different locations. He stashed most of the $18.8 million in a storage shed in Mountain Home, North Carolina, and moved to Mexico City.

On August 30, 1997, a U.S. Customs Agent at a border crossing from Mexico pulled a passenger from a bus bound for Houston, Texas, suspicious of his responses to her questions. Upon further investigation the agent found the identification offered by the passenger to be a known alias for Johnson, and he was arrested when multiple passports were found in his possession.

Independent of Johnson's apprehension, investigators were already following a trail of clues that led to the North Carolina storage shed on September 18, 1997. Approximately $18 million was recovered from the shed. Johnson was subsequently convicted and sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Johnson was released from prison October 3, 2019.[3]

The robbery was featured in an episode of Daring Capers.

See also

References
  1. Karl Vick (1997-07-27). "HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MAN? HE'S 33, SINGLE, LONELY, GROUCHY, RUMPLED AND VERY POSSIBLY THE RICHEST THIEF WHO EVER LIVED". The Washington Post. Washington, D.C. ISSN 0190-8286. OCLC 1330888409.
  2. "Suspect in $22 million armored-car heist arrested". CCN News. August 31, 1997. Archived from the original on December 20, 2007. Retrieved February 25, 2019.
  3. "BOP: Federal Inmates by Name".
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