Commentary: L’argent que personne ne jamais trouver (the money nobody will ever find)

Twenty-one years ago, on June 8, 1989, a Frenchman named Albert Spaggiari died, and with him died the last hope of truly solving one of the crimes of the century.

Albert Spaggiari was the poster child for nature v. nurture. Born in 1932, he became a ne’er-do-well at an early age, and he frequently was in trouble for petty theft and minor larceny. Was he born bad, or was he dealt a bad hand? It was hard to tell. Spaggiari’s mother ran a lingerie shop and was rumored to model her wares in a curtained back room for wealthy male patrons in search of gifts for wives or lovers. His father died when Albert was slightly more than 3 years old. After a short period of struggle, his mother quickly remarried, but things got worse rather than better for the boy. Spaggiari and his stepfather did not, to be polite, see eye to eye. The boy took to roaming the streets, helping himself to the property of others. When his reputation began to close in upon him at age 17, the boy left home, joined the air force and shipped out to Indochina to fight Ho Chi Minh.

Spaggiari’s nature served him well in war. Although wounded at least twice, he persevered and was decorated for bravery. He did not, however, change his ways. Four years after he enlisted, Spaggiari was arrested for breaking into a milk bar in Hanoi and sent back to France for trial and imprisonment. That sentence would be the last time he set foot inside a prison.

After his stint in jail, Spaggiari took up photography. He met and married a nurse, and the couple moved to the south of France. Under the influence of his wife, Albert worked hard to start fresh and opened a photography shop in Nice. He soon began chronicling weddings and other events for some of the more influential families in the area, and he was welcomed in the halls of society and government.

In the 1970s, it was impossible to live in Nice and not know of the branch of the great Société Générale bank that served the town. It was the land-shark version of the Titanic — a massive structure, well reinforced and believed by its designers, owners and patrons to be unsinkable.

It was too big of a temptation for Spaggiari. When, exactly, the Frenchman fell off the go-straight wagon, is not known. What is known, however, is that in early 1976, Spaggiari rented a safety box in the bank’s vault and then left an alarm clock inside it. When the alarm blared at midnight, there was no reaction. No sound or vibrational security systems were triggered, because there were none. The impenetrable bank saw no need for such technology

During the next several weeks, Albert travelled to Marseilles for business, but it was not photography but rather monkey business that drew him to the bigger town. In Marseille, Spaggiari found the laborers of questionable character he needed.

Spaggiari had learned that the sewers of Nice ran abreast to the city’s great bank. Therefore, beginning in early summer, Spaggiari and his crew plunged repeatedly into the sordid sewers. For the next two months, he and his men trudged through the stream of runoff and human waste, dodging rats, while digging a 26-foot tunnel from the sewers to the bank. They used wood to support the walls, adding cement where necessary to protect against rockslides. They laid electric cables, covered the ground with carpets and used oxygen canisters to ensure they had marginally acceptable air to breathe.

Then, on the night of July 16, 1976 — the beginning of France’s Independence Day weekend — a metal cabinet in the corner of the vault of the Société Générale clattered apart, rammed from its mooring by a hydraulic device that had broken through the vault’s walls. Spaggiari and his men were in.

The men sealed the door to the vault shut from the inside with a welding torch, and then they went to work. Although they would ultimately get only 371 of the safety deposit boxes open, they labored ceaselessly, using blowtorches, crowbars and brute force. Compatriots topside used walkie-talkies to let the men in the vault know what was happening above them.

As the long weekend drew to a close, the unseen visitors packed up their gear. Long before Monday’s dawn, as rain began to fill up the sewers, the men departed the bank, floating their take through neck-high water. They left nothing behind but the remnants of the safe deposit boxes they had plundered, the meals they had eaten and a message scrawled on the wall: “Sans Armes, ni Violence, ni Haine” (without weapons, violence or hate).

The bank and local and regional law enforcement sprang into action, and they tracked down one of the gang members a few weeks later. In exchange for leniency, the captured caperer named Spaggiari. Back in photographer mode, Spaggiari was out of town, travelling to the Far East with the Mayor of Nice. It is unclear who was more surprised — Spaggiari or the mayor — when police met their plane on their return and whisked Spaggiari away.

That was when things got interesting.

Spaggiari declined legal representation and stated he intended to represent himself. As his trial began, however, he indicated he was having second thoughts. He asked to see the judge in chambers — a request that was granted. As soon as the men were alone, Spaggiari dashed to the window, opened it and jumped out. The judge ran to the window, only to see the bank robber roaring down the street on the back of a motorcycle.

Despite the daring escape, the trial continued. Spaggiari was tried in absentia, found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. Spaggiari never served a day of his incarceration. He was never seen nor heard of again — until his death from lung cancer. Spaggiari died in Italy, living under an assumed name.

The daring heist has inspired several movies, books and copycat capers. For the legal profession however, it will go down as one of the most bittersweet victories in a prosecutor’s career. A suspect tried, convicted and sentenced, but time never served and l’argent — the bounty — never recovered.

© 2020 under analysis distribution LLC. Under analysis is a nationally syndicated column of the Levison Group. Charles Kramer is a principal of the St Louis-based law firm Riezman Berger PC. Comments or criticisms about this column may be sent to your local paper, or directly to [email protected].