The violent bandits behind Melbourne’s biggest heists
Criminals long ago moved on from big armed robberies, but there was a time when violent heists on banks, armoured vans and payroll deliveries were a constant occurrence. Here are some of the most notorious bandits from that era.
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Criminals long ago moved on from the days of the big armed robbery.
Security and the lucrative attraction of other endeavours like drug-dealing have pretty much consigned the big-time stick-up man to outlaw history.
But there was a time — from the 1970s to the 1990s — when huge heists on banks, armoured vans and payroll deliveries were a constant occurrence across Australia.
Staff were regularly traumatised by the gunmen, some operating in gangs and others by themselves.
Eventually, superior security measures meant the big-time bandits went the way of SP bookies and two-up nights.
Here are some of the most notorious from that era.
AN URBANE ROBBER
Hugo Rich projected an image of affluence and urbanity, the proverbial rat with a gold tooth.
Behind the facade was a ruthless, violent armed robber who would eventually execute one of his many victims in the most senseless fashion.
Until he was convicted for three armed robberies in 1995, Rich projected the image of a stock market whiz, complete with South Yarra digs and prestige car.
The smart and socially adept Rich — whose real name was Olaf Dietrich — had a strong handle on the markets and worked at a leading firm in the early 1990s after a name change erased the heroin-trafficking sins of his past.
But as he schmoozed clients, Rich was hard at work in his other job — pulling off big armed robberies.
Investigators suspect he and accomplices committed eight armed robberies in 1991, bringing home $500,000.
Rich always struck in the height of fashion, donning designer clothing and an imported silk ski mask while scaring the pants off others.
Eventually, police were able to link a series of car thefts from Melbourne Airport to the holdups and put him under surveillance, ultimately busting the bandit and an accomplice.
After long legal proceedings, at times punctuated by frightening, foul-mouthed outbursts, Rich was jailed for a succession of big heists.
But by 2005, he was free again and this time the consequences were fatal.
Rich and an accomplice had robbed security guard Erwin Kastenberger as he delivered cash to an eastern suburbs bank.
For a reason never fully explained, he levelled his weapon at Mr Kastenberger and executed him.
Rich will serve a minimum 30 years for the killing.
True to form, he labelled the judge an “idiot” on the way out of court.
THE BEANIE BANDIT
Old-school bandit Aubrey Broughill had a name that sounded better suited to a seat in parliament than waving a sawn-off.
But the man who gained notoriety as the Beanie Bandit had a career in crime which stretched nearly four decades from a 1961 payroll robbery that netted him 4000 pounds.
After doing time for that, the amiable Broughill went straight for the best part of a decade before making a comeback.
Usually wearing a beanie, he held up seven banks but was arrested after using his own car to commit one of them.
After his prison release in 1986, Broughill -, by then edging towards pension age — decided to go back to the game he knew best.
Armed with a .44 handgun, he started hitting Melbourne bank branches, pulling more than $50,000 from seven of them.
Investigators knew early in the series that it was Broughill but he evaded them for a couple of months.
By the time he was released eight years later, the armed robberies were a thing of the past and he linked up with a group of crooks involved in other arms of crime.
It all ended in 1999 when his body was dragged from a water-filled quarry near Wodonga, in northern Victoria.
An inquest into his death provided no answers on how he died or who was responsible, although one theory is that his running mates might have had some idea.
THE BADNESS
He says he’s turned over a new leaf but there was a time when Chris “Badness” Binse was as big a handful as his nickname suggested.
For a man who has spent more than half his life in jail, Binse caused an enormous amount of trouble during his short stints in the outside world.
Binse loved the money, but he also couldn’t have enough of the adrenaline that came with getting it.
The many years prison time he did in Victoria and New South Wales did little to tame his instincts.
As with many if his ilk, Binse was also involved in escapes, both successful and not so.
He wrote to his police pursuers after one breakout and was considerate enough to send them a Christmas card.
At one stage, authorities at Barwon Prison took the extraordinary step of shackling and handcuffing him 23 hours a day.
During his most recent shot at freedom, he used a motorbike to relieve armed guards of $235,000 at Laverton when he held cash guards at a gaming venue in 2012.
Binse got away but the whole thing ended in a marathon siege at East Keilor where an ice-addled fugitive — who now prefers the surname Pecotic — was arrested.
Binse has vowed his days of crime are over and has even owned up to a few hold-ups no one knew he had committed.
He implicated himself in seven armed robberies over three years from 1988 to 1991 which netted him close to $400,000.
THE GREAT BOOKIE ROBBERY
Raymond Patrick Bennett was the man behind Victoria’s most audacious holdup, the Great Bookie Robbery.
It was a crime planned with military precision, but came with enormous fallout and a high body count, one of them his own.
Bennett was involved in plenty of stick-ups but the raid on the Victoria Club on April 21, 1976, was by far the most successful.
It was settling day for the state’s bookmakers but proceedings ended early when Bennett and five cohorts relieved them of somewhere in the region of $3 million.
Even police were forced to privately commend the execution of the heist.
Bennett had to look over his shoulder, not just for the police, but other criminals wanting a share of the loot, most notably brothers Brian and Les Kane.
A sustained period of violence followed in which numerous big-name gangland identities — including the Kanes — lost their lives.
In the end, Bennett died from the kind of well-planned murder he might have put together himself.
A gunman dressed in a suit gunned him down at the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court in 1979, where he was to appear over a $69,000 payroll robbery at Yarraville.
The killer quickly left the scene as mayhem descended, climbing through a corrugated iron fence which had earlier been modified for the purpose.
He has never been caught.
MAD DOG
Russell “Mad Dog” Cox spent more than a decade as a major target of law enforcement through Australia’s eastern states.
The career criminal born Melville Schnitzerling pulled some major stick-ups over an 11-year period after escaping from Long Bay Prison in Sydney in 1977.
A string of frightening hold-ups preceded the bungled July 1988 Brunswick heist in which security guard Dominic Hefti was shot dead.
It was a crime with enormous fallout.
Armed robbery squad detectives investigating the Brunswick job later shot dead bandit Graeme Jensen at Narre Warren as they tried to arrest him.
It was later established he was not involved with the Hefti matter.
Police constables Steven Tynan and Damian Eyre were murdered the next day in Walsh St, South Yarra, in revenge for Jensen’s death.
Cox was arrested in dramatic circumstances at Doncaster Shoppingtown in 1988.
Police arrested he and another dangerous fugitive, Raymond John Denning, after guards in an armoured van radioed that they were being followed.
Cox is believed to now be living in Queensland.
He remains a person of interest in the death of Dominic Hefti, the execution of Painter and Docker Brian Kane at the Quarry Hotel in Brunswick in 1982 and the murder of
Ian Revell Carroll at Mt Martha in 1983.
THE AFTER DARK BANDIT
Twins Peter and Douglas Morgan were stick-up men with an edge over their pursuers.
Police thought the brothers — schooled in crime from a young age by a criminal father — were one bandit.
They specialised in raids on TABs and banks, pulling off 24 in a 23-month period.
Peter would cause confusion by wearing the same clothes, perplexing investigators with one bandit’s ability to strike within short periods of time.
In some cases they walked through the bush or rode bikes to their country targets.
Peter may be only bandit to have ever paddled from the scene of an armed robbery when he set off into Port Phillip Bay by canoe after hitting the Edithvale TAB.
They won their nickname — the After Dark Bandit — by only striking mostly near closing time.
In 1979, policeman Ray Koch was almost killed by Peter who opened fire as he prepared to rob a Heathcote bank.
Peter was arrested the next day and Douglas soon after.
The full story of the Morgan boys has been told in the recently released book Double Trouble, by Geoff Wilkinson and Ross Brundrett.
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