German Bank Vault Smashed Like Piñata, $36M Worth Steals Christmas Show
KEY POINTS
- •Over Christmas weekend, thieves broke into a Sparkasse Gelsenkirchen branch in Buer by drilling through its concrete vault wall.
- •Police said more than 3,000 safe deposit boxes were forcibly opened, with insured valuables worth at least 31 million euros.
- •Experts suggest the professional job involved special tools and possible inside information from dissatisfied employees.
Christmas in Buer, Germany, was less ’Silent Night’ and more ’Silent Vault’ when over 3,000 safe deposit boxes at Sparkasse Gelsenkirchen got ransacked to the tune of at least $36 million. Local police spokesman Thomas Nowaczyk admitted it felt like a Netflix crime drama when he said, 'I have never heard of any similar case, except on TV.' The clever thieves drilled through concrete walls using, reportedly, 'a very large special tool,' proving once again that holiday cheer for criminals includes a sacrificial fire alarm and zero spontaneous decisions. Locals mourn heirlooms like gold coins from 1988, while criminology professor Michael Levi suspects some insider dirt—because even bank break-ins need HR drama.
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When your Christmas break-in requires industrial drills, insider secrets, and apparently no streaming distractions, you know it’s one heck of a holiday heist.
Who needs Santa when you have professional thieves turning a German vault into their Christmas wish list? Concrete walls just got upgraded to Swiss cheese.
Apparently, holiday weekends turn banks into adult playgrounds for folks with giant drills, inside info, and zero Netflix interruptions.
Source: Businessinsider | Published: 1/1/2026 | Author: Meghan Morris
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