Now worried about both the FBI and McKinney, he spent even more time alone in his room. Hes very articulate. We got this guy named Bruno. He has no contact with any of those convicted with him in the crime, including his former wife, and doesn't plan to see the movie, he said. In real life: False. Steve tried keys on a side door. The money was heavy. And when everybody else voted to kill me, she voted with them, he explains. Real-time updates and all local stories you want right in the palm of your hand. It was an ear-biting, Pierce Brosnan-loving, comet-obsessed world, and were here to relive every minute of it. There was in fact a basically similar conversation involving Chambers and Campbell that took place during a barbecue the Campbells were hosting. In early December, Steve and Michele invited relatives to their daughter's sixth birthday party. Sweat soaked David's uniform. 27 febrero, 2023 . Question: How much of 'Masterminds' is true? October was "a blast," he said. Kelly called David at. Chambers went from a mobile home in Lincoln County to a mansion in Cramerton. Ghantt:It started out as a mental exercise and somewhere between the mental exercise and the actual event, it became serious. They set the date, Oct. 4, a Saturday when David knew he could be alone in the building after his shift. These days, the 52-year-old husband and father lives in Jacksonville, Florida, where he works at a heavy equipment rental agency. I knew that the news wouldnt break until later that morning. This was in the 1990s the Columbia Airport back then was closed at around 9:30, 10 oclock. Scott Grant and Steve pulled up next to her in a Mazda. So it was weird when during the middle of the week, there were these very clean-cut, very Midwestern looking, obviously American guys in the town. I wish them all a happy life and that's about it. Time passed, and Campbell eventually quit her job at Loomis Fargo. It's one of the biggest jokes at the place. . There, Scott and Eric paced the floor as Steve tried to calm them down. The FBI's final challenge is finding the remaining $2 million. [Kelly] told me, 'Just think about it.' Meanwhile, back in North Carolina, Ghantts wife woke up to find her husband missing. Besides her prison sentence . FILE - Kelly Campbell, one of the 21 people convicted for their involvement in the $17 million Loomis Fargo heist, awaits sentencing for her part in the theft at her mobile home near Mount Holly, N.C. on Aug 16, 1999. Things started to go south the night of the robbery. DUMB & - The Washington Post Steven Chambers [Misc. Kelly Campbell, 29, a former company employee, entered guilty pleas earlier to bank larceny, money laundering and conspiracy to commit murder charges. When he walked onto the plane, he was wearing big, tall cowboy boots, where hed stuffed a majority of the smuggled cash. When we worked together [for Loomis], we'd joke about it. When Chambers and the two Erics were done loading the stolen millions into barrels, they abandoned the van in the woods. Theres no management around. But because David's relationship with his Loomis bosses had been rocky, he says, he doesn't feel sorry about what he did to the company. I said, Probably, the best time would be on the weekend; theres fewer people there. The cart held about $2 million, and the thief made multiple trips. "She said, 'What would it take to convince you to do it?' (The conversation was depicted as 100 percent private on screen). Twelve hours later, at 6 that evening, Eric Payne drove a rented Budget van to his workplace, a graphics company on Performance Road in western Mecklenburg County called Reynolds & Reynolds, which was closed for the night and had a secluded parking lot where they intended to transfer the cash. Ghantt started at Loomis Fargo in 1994, and soon worked his way up from an armored car driver to a vault supervisor. Jeffrey Guller, who at 81 is by far the oldest of the Loomis defendants, still owes almost $1.1 million on his original court debt of $1.14 million and will remain on the governments books for another four years. He took bus tours of Mayan ruins. 2500 City West Blvd., Suite 2300 Houston, TX 77042. . . Kelly Loomis Facebook, Instagram & Twitter on PeekYou Careers. Question: Are you happy that Wilkesboro-nativeZach Galifianakis plays you in the movie? As it turned out, Ghantt was zipping up his scuba suit in Mexico. One day, Campbell was speaking to an old friend named Steve Chambers. Each week, Michele deposited thousands of dollars in cash. Besides her prison sentence, Campbell must undergo mental health and drug treatment and spend two years in a supervised release program. "I felt that if I didn't do something, I was going to snap," David said. The bigger the amount, however, the bigger the damages to victims that likely will never be repaid: Amy Paynes collection account was closed in 2020 with her having paid $53,000 of the $274,000 she owed. On Oct. 7, 1997, two FBI agents arrived at Kelly Campbell's home after two Loomis employees had told agents she and David had once dated. "You" has three. Jim Gronquist, Campbells defense attorney during the Loomis case, says the financial penalties levied against his client and her co-defendants are grossly excessive and unjust, particularly since most of the stolen Loomis money was actually recovered. Federal law stops government collection efforts 20 years after a defendant leaves prison. He'd stay up all night, boosted by coffee, waiting for the sunrise over the ocean. "I'd been told all my life, money will not make you happy," Kelly said. "For the first year, they're all over you. Why do we feel its so necessary to treat people like this, to say, OK, well just ruin the rest of your life because you made a bad decision., Punishment should not last a lifetime. Michelle, meanwhile, purchased new breasts for herself, along with a $43,000 diamond ring and a new convertible BMW Z3. But it was the rural, Southern backgrounds of many of the key players, along with the many botched twists and bungled turns, that led the media to dub it the hillbilly heist.. Ghantt, meanwhile, was losing his patience and starting to make threats. Eventually, Steve made Kelly believe they could steal from Loomis and get away with it, she said. The barrels were Steves idea, Ghantt says. By March, Steve Chambers decided he needed to do something more drastic about Ghantt, making plans to send a hitman to Mexico to silence him for good. Him and I still talk every now and then. So he and some friends decided at the end of his Oct. 4 shift he would load a company van with more than 2,000 pounds of cash and just drive away. They Had 17 Million Dollars and No Sense at All - AMW Magazine Back in North Carolina, Ghantts former accomplices were living high on the hog. The movie was overly silly and, based on a post-screening conversation with former Observer reporter Jeff Diamant who wrote a detailed 279-page book about the occasionally funny but mostly just-plain fascinating crime, titled Heist much of what wound up in the film is fiction. The plan was to split the money three ways: Chambers, Campbell and Ghantt would each walk away with what Ghantt estimated to be $5 million a piece the kind of money that changes lives forever. Channel 9 speaks with the man at the center of Loomis Fargo heist 25 No hard feelings. He was also a former FBI informant who had tipped the bureau off to a planned robbery of a Loomis Fargo armored truck that never came to fruition. These (Loomis) guys, not so much.. Butcher says the federal courts in the Western District of North Carolina have never handled a case quite like Loomis. One night in a small North Carolina town, a down-on-his-luck guard at Loomis Fargo manages to steal $17 millionliterally more than one ton of cash. Where was Ghantt? No dry runs, no rehearsals. Down in Jacksonville, a Loomis Fargo employee took $18 million from an armored van he was driving. "It probably should bother me," he said. But first they wanted to know if it was a robbery or a robbery-homicide. Im on the phone with Kelly [Campbell], and Im like, Hey, I really was expecting a package to arrive. (John D. Simmons/The Charlotte Observer via AP), Police: Officer Who Shot Black Man Retired 'In Bad Standing', 3 Kansas City Officers Who Were Shot Released From Hospital, 1 Killed When Business Jet Encounters Severe Turbulence. Things were spiraling fast. Down in Jacksonville, a Loomis Fargo employee took $18 million from an armored van he was driving. Though David had said earlier he thought there was $15 million in the vault, the sight of that much cash held them spellbound. And I think that makes it all the more funny, because it really offends my co-defendants. Her marriage--at which she was making another ambivalent effort after multiple separations--and even the jobs she'd been able to get with a diploma couldn't come close to providing the kind of life she dreamed about, the life she felt she deserved: a house in the country, a swimming pool, and enough cash so she didn't need to rely on men. On his second trip, Steve gave McKinney David's hotel address. . Zach always plays that bumbling kind of lunatic, but hes not, Ghantt says. Steve told her to send David to Atlanta on a bus and drive back to the trailer. So I was glad it was over. White-collar criminals are pretty good at hiding their money, she said. But former Kings Mountain resident David Scott Ghantt can. He was doing what the rest of us were doing making bad decisions. Kelly drove her pickup to a lot across the street from the Loomis building, on Suttle Avenue in Charlotte. You might as well take it all, Ghantt tells me. More than half of the amount came from the seizure of a luxury home purchased by husband-and-wife defendants during their post-heist spending spree. Going south, nobody really looks at what youre shipping. And youre like, Come on parachute. At 6-1 and 220 pounds, Steve was stocky and imposing, a fast talker with a brown goatee. You've violated that trust. I really enjoyed the little scuba diving trip. She was a wife and mother with two children. There was a third person with them, too, a man named Eric Grant. Restitution is a familiar part of sentencing in federal court. I told them, Take it, box it up, and youll be able to ship it to me in Mexico. Back in the 1990s, you couldve probably boxed up a hot pink elephant and shipped it to Mexico; no one wouldve ever noticed. He told him McKinney was in Mexico to kill somebody. They decorated their 6,000-square-foot stucco house with antiques, paintings and statues, including a six-foot wooden Indian that Michele had bought for $600. They soon realized David had stolen more money than would fit in their 55-gallon barrels. The bash had a Cinderella theme, with a three-tiered cake that looked like a castle. I had a four-hour layover there, and then from New Orleans to Cancun.. Loomis Fargo Defendants Owe as Much as They Stole in 1997 I couldn't understand why I hadn't been more successful," David said. Thats nearly $11 million less than former Kings Mountain resident David Ghantt (played by Galifianakis in the film) helped steal from the vault where he worked in Charlotte back in October 1997. That was pretty awesome., It felt like a dream vacation until he started running out of money. Ghantt:I don't think he ever really meant to harm me. About 200 keys dangled from it. There was a little voice in my head that said, 'Don't do it. Three weeks later, the couple purchased, in cash, a $635,000 stone mansion. The whole town I was staying in was 98.9 percent Mexican, except for when the cruise ships were in, Ghantt recalls. Industry leading Training and Development. Careers | Loomis US Steve told Scott to ignore the remaining stacks, which were mostly ones and fives. Ghantt:I hate to say it, but I had six years of sitting in a box to think about my life. Thatd be the time to do it, Ghantt recalls. When McKinney realized Ghantt was wanted for the Loomis Fargo robbery, he backed off personally because he didnt want to be anywhere near a federal investigation. Thatd probably been the best thing for me to do, really. He had even scheduled a follow-up appointment at the dentist. Now two NC men face prison. Heist: The Oddball Crew Behind the $17 Million Loomis Fargo Theft by He placed stacks of currency on a cart and wheeled it to the van about 15 feet away, inside the building. More agents waited outside to arrest them. In February 1998, the FBI tapped their phones and listened to Steve discuss depositing $2.5 million in the Cayman Islands. It was unclear whether anyone will get that money, authorities said. As he and Kelly met in a field behind a shooting range to refine the plan, she allowed him to believe she was falling for him. Key benefit components include: Health insurance plans. Thanksgiving and Christmas were difficult. "I thought he was goofing around.". She didn't plan to move to Mexico. My love for my family is by far the most important thing in my life. Should David be killed after he gave them the money? He learned to parachute. By the time the month concluded, the couple had purchased a 7,000-square-foot stone mansion in a gated country club community. Kelly was no criminal. The robbery of some $17 million quickly became one of the wildest bank heists of the last quarter century. Ghantt and one other employee were the last to leave. Soon thereafter, he met Kelly Campbell, a co-worker at Loomis Fargo. I had to go in there and tell her the whole story, and she was real cool about it. David didn't even know Steve's name. The last time he called me, he said, Hey Ghantt, I just saw a big Loomis Fargo truck. Kelly, using David's cell phone, kept beeping him. Charlotte hotel chef who serves with a smile recognized as outstanding ambassador, Eritrean, Ethiopian restaurant owner was a big brother and father to many in Charlotte, Home tours: This wired-up Weddington smart home has a pool big enough for the neighborhood. Mexican police, Interpol officers and an FBI agent were watching him. Tickle Me Kaczynski: How the Inventor of the Ultimate Elmo Toy Became a Unabomber Suspect, A Highly Questionable Cultural History of Richard Geres Ass Gerbil. But few could have guessed how spectacularly the heist would go wrong after the criminals initially got away with it. "I was unhappy with my life. In the wee hours of the morning, Chambers and the Erics drove back to the town of Vale, North Carolina, and holed up in a double-wide trailer while counting their cash. When neighbors asked where they got their money, Steve said hed played in the NFL. So I guess I have no regrets. (John D. Simmons/The Charlotte Observer via AP) The Associated Press, BY MICHAEL GORDON, The Charlotte Observer. He worked fueling airplanes, driving a forklift, and in 1994 he got a job as a vault superintendent at Loomis. Cool, I say. For reasons that remain obscure, Robert spilled the beans to David. The next day, he was sitting next to FBI agent Mark Rozzi on a US Airways flight to Charlotte. About 5:30 the next morning, McKinney knocked on David's door and dropped $8,500 on the bed. Filming in the Asheville area starting in early July, and is. He didnt even really question me. . The platform is designed to engage citizens and government leaders in a discussion about what needs improvement across the country. He flip-flopped on the heist idea three or four times. real kelly campbell loomis fargo heist real kelly campbell loomis fargo heist (No Ratings Yet) . Throughout the multi-year-long case and subsequent trials, journalists often referred to Ghantt and the others as trailer trash and hillbillies. Was that really what it was about? As you probably know, it's loosely based on the Loomis Fargo heist in Charlotte back in the late nineties. Even still, he was 27, married and struggling to provide for his family. . The FBI, in fact, obtained the evidence they needed to bring down the major players, including Chambers, after catching them talking about the murder plot on the telephone via wiretap. "Every time my conscience would start bothering me," Kelly recalled, "I'd smoke another joint and forget about it.". Except the person he offered $150,000 to mule $2.5 million down to Ghantt in Mexico turned him down and instead went to the FBI. The van door opened. Find 145 people named Kelly Loomis along with free Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok profiles on PeekYou - true people search. Steve told me to tell [David] whatever was necessary to keep him happy.". By . Kelly Campbell - Wikipedia When Ghantt was on the plane home from Mexico with the FBI, he admitted to the agents that while Campbell had been integral to why hed done it and that he did indeed have a crush on her it was never his true motivation. Michelle Chambers paid off only $27,000. He's a very likable person. Kelly drove her pickup to a lot across the street from the Loomis building, on Suttle Avenue in Charlotte. Its in the ether. Masterminds (2016 film) - Wikipedia For his part, Ghantt was now officially on his way to Mexico, his future stretched out before him. In the meantime, the FBI was closing in looking to bust a total of 21 suspected accomplices. and "I'm rich!". They bought a BMW roadster. CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) _ A woman who helped plan the $17 million robbery of armored car company Loomis, Fargo & Co. was sentenced Tuesday to nearly six years in prison and ordered to pay back more than $4 million. Before David left for the airport, he had handed Scott an eight-inch key ring. real kelly campbell loomis fargo heist. It changes you. Fact check: Is there much truth to the new 'Masterminds' movie And it turned Steve into he thought he was Don Corleone all of a sudden.. Actor Owen Wilson plays him in the movie, which includes the real names of all the major players.

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