Third bank robbery in Germany in a month: all in North Rhine-Westphalia
Germany has reported the third bank robbery in recent weeks. Four broken safes were found in a Sparkasse branch on Station Street in Halle, North Rhine-Westphalia, in the west of the country, local police said.
Police believe the robbery took place during business hours on December 30. According to bank employees, the crime occurred between 12:45 and 13:10 and did not involve forced entry.
The broken safes were located in a storage room in the basement. It is not yet known what exactly was stored in these safes. Law enforcement officials have asked anyone who might have witnessed the incident to report it.
It has not been reported how many people were affected by the attackers’ actions or whether the safes belonged to the same person. There is also no information on the amount of damage caused.
The first robbery took place in Bonn on December 17, but it was reported only at the end of the month. Two safes were opened in the Sparkasse branch on the central Friedensplatz square, and a large amount of valuables, mostly gold, was stolen.
Sparkasse is a network of German savings banks operating primarily at the local level. Sparkassen form the largest banking group in Germany by number of customers and branches, focusing on retail banking and lending to small and medium-sized businesses.
Police suspected a 22-year-old former bank employee of the crime. His home was searched, and the man was taken to the police station but later released, Deutsche Welle reports.
On December 30, it became known about a robbery at a bank branch in Gelsenkirchen. The criminals drilled a hole in the concrete wall between the room with the bank safes and the adjacent parking lot.
Several thousand safes were broken into during the robbery. Initially, it was reported that the total damage was estimated at 30 million euros.
However, on January 2, the German tabloid Bild reported that criminals had stolen more than 100 million euros from the Sparkasse in Gelsenkirchen. This robbery is considered one of the largest in Germany’s history.
On January 1, police admitted that they still did not have any serious evidence that would allow them to get on the trail of the robbers.
- Losses from the Louvre robbery that took place in October 2025, is estimated at 88 million euros. However, France will not receive payments for the stolen jewelry because they were not insured.
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