A Christmas Day heist in Langley six years ago netted a pair of thieves almost half a million dollars – and the money has never been recovered, a recent B.C. court ruling revealed.
Although there have never been arrests or charges laid, the case has gone to court to get a ruling in a union grievance between the armoured car firm Brinks Canada Ltd., and the employee suspected of masterminding the heist.
The employee is not named in the ruling that was handed down on Nov. 28 by Justice Christopher Giaschi in B.C. Supreme Court in Vancouver. He or she is referred to only as the Grievor.
According to Giaschi’s ruling, the robbery took place on Dec. 25, 2016, when several ATMs at various Langley branches were robbed by two people.
“The thieves made off with approximately $460,000,” said Giaschi’s ruling.
The theft does not appear to have been reported publicly at the time.
The bank later determined that the alarms at each location had been deactivated and then re-activated using alarm codes assigned to Brinks, which delivers cash to many banks and ATM locations.
In January of 2017, the bank demanded that Brinks pay it back $463,220, and Brinks complied.
“A police investigation into the robberies have not resulted in any charges being laid to date,” Giaschi wrote.
Over the next two years, Brinks conducted its own internal investigation, and came to believe that one of its employees was responsible.
The Grievor was on medical leave at the time of the robberies, and one of the two robbers caught on video “bears a resemblance to the Grievor.”
The robbers appeared to have knowledge of the locations that a Brinks employee would, the alarm codes they used had been issued to one of the Grievor’s co-workers, and a cloned electronic key to a high-security Mas Hamilton lock was used in the robbery.
The co-worker whose codes were used is not a suspect.
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After the investigation, Brinks fired the Grievor on Nov. 16, 2018. Three days later, the company filed a grievance with Unifor Local 114, which represents the fired employee, and demanded the return of the money, plus interest.
On Dec. 7, 2018, Local 114 filed a grievance over the Grievor’s firing. Both grievances were to be heard together.
The court ruling issued this November was about whether or not an arbitrator had jurisdiction to make a decision in the ongoing dispute. Giaschi ruled in favour of Brinks that the arbitrator does have jurisdiction to hear the grievance demanding the return of the missing cash.
The Langley Advance Times has reached out to Brinks for comment on the robbery.
Have a story tip? Email: matthew.claxton@langleyadvancetimes.com
