Burglaries | 60 Minutes Full Episodes
In a Nutshell
The video profiles three major burglary operations: the Dinner Set Gang, who stole tens of millions in jewelry from wealthy homeowners during dinner; the unsolved $200 million Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art heist; and a nationwide heavy equipment theft ring that moves $250 million annually through Houston alone. These operations succeed due to predictable victim routines, lack of registration/identification systems, and minimal law enforcement resources. The core message is that sophisticated, non-violent theft of high-value items continues largely unchecked because current security and regulatory systems are inadequate.
These notes were generated by AI and may contain inaccuracies.
In the hierarchy of the underworld, no criminals are more romanticized than cat burglars. They are thinking man's thieves who rely on stealth and surprise instead of violence, using planning and imagination to separate valuable baubles from unsympathetic victims, meaning the super rich and their insurance companies. That's the movie version. Despite technological advances in burglar alarms and motion detectors and the proliferation of security firms, more than a hundred cat burglars are thought to be operating just in the state of Florida. The Palm Beach Sheriff's Office says many of them have adopted their techniques from two of the very best, who were called the Dinner Set Gang.
Peter Serno claimed he was the best jewel thief. He was indisposed, serving time in a Miami prison not for stealing jewels, but for illegally distributing oxycontin, a painkiller he was taking to ease occupational backache from decades of climbing up the sides of buildings and breaking into bedrooms. His longtime accomplice, lookout, and logistics man was his brother-in-law, Dominic Latella. Latella estimated their total hold over all those years was in the tens of millions.
Their salad days were in the late 60s and 70s when they preyed on the super rich who wintered in Palm Beach, where diamonds seemed to drip from every neck and earlobe, and pearls were something worn to play tennis. Serno and Latella revolutionized society burglaries. Instead of robbing the rich while they were out on the town wearing their best pieces, they cleaned them out at home while they were eating dinner. This is why the police dubbed them the Dinner Set Gang. The wealthy don't eat dinner like most Americans. They dress for it, usually invite guests, and are summoned to the dining room by butlers and maids to savor multi-course meals and polite conversations that can go on for hours. It's considered impolite to get up from the table, so if you're a burglar watching through a window, the ritual becomes very predictable.
Serno and Latella noted that their victims never expected anybody to be in their homes while having dinner. The burglar alarms were probably shut off. The best jewelry was upstairs. Serno was the second story guy. While he was upstairs, Latella would be downstairs watching the people. If he felt someone was going up the stairs, he would alert Serno by whistle. They would spend only three minutes inside. Serno had a sixth sense of finding jewelry in master suites, dressing areas, and closet areas.
When the social season ended in Palm Beach and the wealthy moved north, the Dinner Set Gang moved with them to New York and Connecticut. Retired detectives Billy Adams and Jim Hirs knew exactly who they were and spent 20 years trying to catch them. In anything that has been read in the last 40 years regarding jewel thieves, Peter Serno's name always comes up. He is the standard by which all other jewel thieves are judged. They hit large homes and their average hit was about a quarter of a million dollars back in the early 70s. They were doing better than Wall Street.
The Dinner Set Gang researched their jobs in local libraries, developing leads from Forbes magazine's list of wealthiest Americans, getting addresses from Who's Who in America, and perusing photo spreads in Architectural Digest and Town and Country. They stole $168,000 in jewels from the home of Reader's Digest founder DeWitt Wallace while he and his wife were finishing dessert. That was pocket change compared to the $5 million they scored from an heir to the Flagler Railroad fortune while she was hosting a seated black tie dinner.
Their biggest score was in the exclusive community of Hobe Sound, north of Palm Beach. Hobe Sound was an impregnable refuge for the wealthy with one road in and one road out. Serno and Latella bought a raft and mounted an amphibious assault. One night, as an heir to the DuPont fortune sat down to dinner, Latella and Serno beached their raft, breached the bedroom, and in a matter of minutes pulled off one of the biggest jewelry heists in history. Serno found a big traveling leather case in a linen closet that was stamped where she came through customs in different countries. It was locked, and he popped it open.
The haul included two big sapphires, a 25 karat and a 22 karat round faceted sapphire, a ruby with all big mares coming up like a Christmas tree, a terrific emerald that was 12, 14, or 15 carats, a set of beautiful pearls with a 5 karat marquee canary yellow marquee clasp, and a 17.65 natural pink flawless pear-shaped diamond worth $1.8 million at that time. The total haul was $12 million. The pink diamond is now with some Arab sheik.
Serno and Latella headed to New York to celebrate with a gray-haired man named Wally Gans, who was their fence. He was in the 47th Street Diamond Exchange, which is the biggest exchange in the world. They have their own vaults and don't go to banks. They only collected 10 cents on the dollar, the going rate for hot jewelry, and there was the occasional tribute to friends in the mob. There was more than enough money for Serno and Latella and the twin sisters they married, Gloria and Sandra Ceino.
There was always a lot of money around. They put it in envelopes of $20,000 at a time, put them in the envelopes, closed the envelope, then put them in safe deposit boxes. They had to go to the safe deposit box and change boxes because they couldn't put another envelope in it. They spent the money on new cars, clothes, homes, boats, and traveling. Serno had a Scarab, and Latella had a 450 Mercedes. Pete had a Rolls.
The money started to run out in the 1980s when they flirted with the notion of going legit. They started a construction company that built condominiums and lost their shirts when the real estate market crashed. Both men developed a taste for cocaine, and Pete did a stretch in prison. When he got out, Gloria Serno had been diagnosed with breast cancer. They headed north in the winter of 1991 and went on a major crime spree looking for quick scores. Serno never did 40 jobs in one month, but he was obsessed and wasn't going to let her die because of lack of money. That money saved her life.
They got careless and broke their rules, not knowing their target, not knowing where they were going, knowing their escape, working in the winter, especially in the snow. One of the first houses they hit was one they had broken into nearly 20 years before. Even the victims were the same. When Adams saw the hit come in on the police report, all he said was, "They're back." Adams sent out a bulletin alerting police departments in the surrounding areas that the Dinner Set Gang was back in business.
On January 21st, 1992, at a house in Westport, Connecticut, their luck finally ran out. The owner of the house called 911, and within a few minutes the woods were teeming with cops and dogs. They flooded and they stayed. It wasn't one of those "yippy cay, I'm in here for 15 minutes and we're out of here." They stayed, pulled back, made a sweep, made sure everybody was safe, pulled back and waited, then brought the dog again. It was like blowing snow, maybe 10 degrees out, and finally they conceded that it didn't look good. Both men were arrested, and the police were able to link them to a number of previous burglaries. Latella served nine years in prison. Serno served four.
They don't have anyone to chase anymore because they're retired and collecting pensions. The Dinner Set wives have drifted back to the middle class, working retail in a Fort Lauderdale mall. Dominic Latella, who is still on parole, is selling used boats. He says he's out of the burglary business now. If he had it to do over again, he would live his life the same way, though he has certain regrets about scarring anybody from feeling violated. He says if it's any consolation, they were gentlemen and weren't there to hurt anybody. He doesn't regret becoming a jewel thief and liked the life, the excitement.
Two years ago, some of the world's most valuable art was lifted from a Boston museum. Works including Rembrandt's only seascape, one of only 32 Vermeer paintings in the world, a Manet, and some Degas. Thirteen pieces in all worth at least $200 million. Perhaps the biggest art theft ever. It happened one night in Boston at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum at 1:00 a.m. on March 18th, 1990. Two men dressed as Boston cops came to the side door of the museum. They knocked and told the guards they were responding to a report of a disturbance. In moments, the guards were overwhelmed, bound, and gagged. The thieves went to work.
The museum was built at the turn of the century by the eccentric Isabella Stewart Gardner as a copy of an Italian villa. She lived here and scoured Europe for this eclectic collection. For two hours, the thieves roamed these halls. Among the paintings stolen were Rembrandt's Storm on the Sea of Galilee and Vermeer's The Concert. Peter Sutton, curator of European paintings at Boston's Museum of Fine Arts, notes their paintings of extraordinary significance. The early Rembrandt is a very large and ambitious picture of wonderful theatrics and the only marine painting in his entire oeuvre. The Vermeer is perfectly poised and balanced, kind of an inevitable geometry.
It was not until 7 the next morning that the two guards were found still bound and gagged in the basement. The art world was in shock. In all, 13 objects were taken by two men who were later described by the guards to police artists as being in their late 20s or early 30s and speaking with Boston accents. Brian McDev says he's an expert on this kind of heist because he was once part of an international ring that stole to order. He believes this was clearly an operation that somebody paid for. They wanted those two specific paintings. His best professional guess is that the Gardner paintings are now in Japan.
There is the possibility some billionaire is gloating over the paintings. It's also possible they're being held for ransom. Agent Howard Apple of the FBI says there is a million dollar reward in this case, and to his knowledge, no one has ever come forth with an offer to return the pieces of stolen art. Up to 40 agents at a time have been working on the case. The paintings have been put into the stolen art computer network and distributed throughout the world through Interpol, but in 2 and a half years, nothing.
There was one thing: a robbery attempt 10 years earlier that seemed almost a blueprint for the Gardner heist. It was at the Hyde Museum in upstate New York. The Hyde family built their museum in Glenn's Falls shortly after the Gardner was built. It was a mini Gardner. They purchased similar paintings, a few Rembrandts, a Vermeer, and other valuable European works. In 1980, there was an elaborate attempt to rob the museum. It was planned from the Queensberry Hotel in Glenn's Falls, where the brains behind it had taken up permanent residence.
A young man whom the assistant manager remembers well, known as Paul Vanderbilt, spent months casing the museum and gave the impression he might be a major benefactor. He drove a Bentley. Vanderbilt and an accomplice worked for months on a detailed plan to rob the Hyde. They dressed up as Federal Express men, hijacked a Federal Express van, bound and gagged the driver, but got stuck in traffic, which ruined their timing and thwarted their plan. They were caught and quickly confessed. Paul Vanderbilt, it turns out, was not a Vanderbilt at all, but a 20-year-old conman from the Boston area named McDev.
Brian McDev is now an allegedly reformed and talkative art thief and a suspect in the Gardner heist. He confessed to the attempted robbery of the Hyde Museum in Glenn's Falls, New York in December 1980. He cased it very carefully and knew what he wanted to take. What he wanted was much the same as was taken from the Gardner: Vermeer and Rembrandt. The Gardner heist seemed to be a successful copycat of the botched Hyde caper. The disguises, the way the guards were bound and gagged, the same threatening language, even the way the paintings were removed. Had he gotten away with it at the Hyde, the paintings would have been transferred to Japan, to Tokyo.
Brian McDev was living in Boston at the time of the Gardner robbery in an apartment building on Beacon Hill. His neighbors say he left town soon after the heist without letting anyone know. He doesn't have an alibi for the morning of March 18th. McDev has a history of deception and theft. He's been convicted for five felonies. Before the Hyde attempt, he stole at least $60,000 in cash and $100,000 in bearer bonds from a safe deposit box in Boston.
McDev now claims that in fleeing Detective Roy Prout, he ended up in Brazil and fell in with an art theft ring. He describes it as like living a James Bond film or "It Takes a Thief," dropping through skylights. He may see himself as a high society second story man. In fact, he's a garden variety con man. He says it was easy for a guy who speaks pretty well, looks pretty well, dresses pretty well to be a con man, but that was when he was 19, 20, and 21, over a decade ago.
McDev is now 32, living in Hollywood where he went to reinvent himself as a new, clean McDev who would launch himself on a literary career or at least become a screenwriter. He joined the Hollywood chapter of the Writers Guild of America. They were impressed and put him in charge of grants. He linked up with a fledgling writer named Ben Pollock and they formed a company. But old habits die hard. He told Pollock that he was a writer for the New Yorker, that he had won the Hemingway award and the O'Henry award, had written on Hope and Glory the film, had ghostwritten Soapdish, and had done several television shows.
Ben Pollock became curious and did some research and found McDev's resume to be pure fiction. McDev told him to basically not tell anybody what he found out about him. Pollock found it frightening, an implied threat. McDev was asked if he would pass a lie detector test. He said he would pass without a shadow of a doubt. The FBI suggested it, but they discussed it and decided not to take it based on the fact that it's considered unreliable. The FBI continues to press McDev, but clearly has nothing solid to pin on him.
As for McDev himself, you never know when, if ever, to believe anything he says. You do get the distinct feeling that he wants you to believe he did steal the paintings. Conmen are a strange breed. As for the Gardner, under the terms of Mrs. Gardner's will, the paintings must never be rearranged. So the museum, trying its best, has left a space and a card where once Vermeer and Rembrandt were hanging. Empty spaces filled with possibilities. The question remains: what happened to the paintings? Are they with a collector now? Or did a small-time conman really pull off the heist of the century? And could he be sitting on a stash worth $200 million with no place to sell it?
The next time you go to the grocery store and find the prices out of sight, or try to rent office space and find it will cost you an arm and a leg, or you find your car insurance bill keeps going up year after year, it may be that it's not just inflation that is putting a crimp in your pocketbook. There is a new style of burglar operating all over the country who may also be adding to your cost of living. These burglars are stealing farm and construction equipment, and the billions they are getting away with are being passed on to consumers in higher food bills, higher insurance fees, and higher rents and construction costs. It's a nationwide problem, but one of the places where it is most acute is Houston, Texas, where cat burglars, robbers who steal heavy equipment such as Caterpillar bulldozers and tractors
Cat burglars steal heavy equipment including Caterpillar bulldozers, tractors, and backhoe loaders. Machines are an easy mark like unbranded cattle. The Case 580C backhoe loader can be started by placing a knife or piece of metal across two posts on the solenoid above the starting engine. Keys are easily obtained - one key fits any Ford tractor manufactured over the last 20 years. Two keys will start just about any piece of Case heavy equipment. Thieves can also use a pin knife in the ignition to start equipment within minutes.
The backhoe loader is the most stolen piece of construction equipment in the country, worth about $30,000. Also highly stolen are wheel loaders worth about $60,000, track loaders worth $100,000, and bulldozers worth $200,000.
Stolen heavy equipment often goes to fill specific orders. Royce Featherston, who stole over a million dollars worth of heavy equipment, described how a university professor wanted a farm tractor and paid a good price for it. The tractor was worth approximately $12,000, and Featherston sold it for $4,000. Featherston was caught for the second time after stealing five big tractors and is serving a 5-year sentence at Darrington Prison Farm outside Houston.
A fence with 30 years experience who asked not to be identified has been dealing almost exclusively in stolen heavy equipment for over a year and is out on bond awaiting trial. He has moved 50 pieces of equipment in one year, worth approximately $350,000 to him, all tax-free. Buyers include a chairman of the board of one of the biggest savings and loans.
Equipment is frequently stolen as part of insurance fraud schemes where owners move bulldozers, deliver them elsewhere, or hide them before reporting them stolen. Insurance companies pay claims so quickly that owners and thieves use this as a quick way to make money. Based on the fence's experience, approximately 50% of stolen equipment is taken for insurance fraud purposes.
Royce Featherston explained that most places aren't even fenced, and if they are fenced, he just cuts through. Guards have predictable schedules that thieves can work around. Ray Higgins, a construction superintendent in Houston, had a tractor stolen worth about $18,000 and another complete job taken worth $30,000. Bice Barry, who rents equipment, had 10 tractors stolen from him with only two insured, resulting in losses of $600,000 to $700,000 including downtime and production losses.
Houston has only one detective in the police department available to track stolen equipment. Detective Bob Olsen has been covering this beat for four years. At a freight depot, officers examined a tractor awaiting shipment out of the country with all serial numbers removed. Detective Olsen suspected it was stolen but could do nothing because there are no proper serial numbers stamped into the metal on all machines, unlike cars or trucks.
There is no paperwork trail, no titling or registration for heavy equipment. If an officer sees heavy equipment rolling down the road, there is nothing to check - no license plate required, no registration. This makes recoveries of stolen pieces virtually impossible, with only one out of ten recovered compared to seven out of ten for stolen automobiles and trucks.
Sometimes stolen equipment crosses state lines, but the FBI places little priority on stopping it. Equipment moves through the port of Houston bound for countries worldwide where it brings higher prices. An estimated 30 to 40% goes overland from Houston to Mexico. Conservatively, $250 million worth of heavy farm and construction equipment passes into Mexico each year, with a significant portion being stolen.
Truckers hauling stolen equipment fill out an SED (Shipper Export Declaration) primarily used for Commerce Department statistics. US Customs does not check the accuracy of these declarations. On the Mexican side, thieves deal with federalis by making deals ahead of time, either paying them or trading merchandise for favors. One thief mentioned carrying four vehicles - three new Broncos and one new four-wheel drive pickup - that went straight to the federalis.
Lightweight equipment is sometimes suspended from giant cranes at the end of each day. Security fences are being erected though they don't always work. Special locks are being tried, and some owners mark equipment with decals, individual numbers, or special paint jobs. However, Detective Olsen made only two cases against buyers in his best year despite $21 million worth of equipment being stolen, and only about 12 cases against actual thieves.
Registration is suggested as a possible remedy, but manufacturers and contractors resist it, claiming it would mean more government control, more bureaucracy, and more paperwork. Manufacturers also resist because registration could mean stricter enforcement of environmental standards and would let competitors know production and sales figures. Registration would prevent manufacturers from selling older machines as new models at higher prices. Contractors would have to admit to tax authorities how much equipment they actually owned.
A pending congressional bill would only begin a study of ways to combat heavy equipment theft nationwide. Equipment manufacturers, dealers, and users are lobbying hard against the bill and appear to be defeating it, apparently fearing government and taxes more than they fear the thieves.
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