Brazil's Biggest-Ever Bank Heist Foiled at the Eleventh Hour

(Bloomberg) -- Brazil's police arrested 16 men tunneling toward a vault containing 1 billion reais ($318 million) and who were on the verge of pulling off the largest-ever bank robbery in the country's history.

An investigative police unit had been monitoring the criminals' activities as they manufactured the metal structure to support the 600-meter (2,000-foot) tunnel, laid tracks to cart out the banknotes and ran electricity underground, according to a statement from its press office. The men were mere hours away from drilling into the vault of state-owned Banco do Brasil in Sao Paulo when they were arrested on Monday, police said.

Had they succeeded, their plunder would have dwarfed the nation's largest heist on record that likewise utilized a tunnel from a nearby home. In that 2005 episode, thieves broke into the central bank's regional office in Fortaleza, making off with 3.5 metric tons of currency worth 165 million reais. It inspired a film, Federal Bank Heist.

To contact the reporter on this story: David Biller in Rio de Janeiro at dbiller1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Vivianne Rodrigues at vrodrigues3@bloomberg.net, Walter Brandimarte