Another episode was added on Tuesday to the series of missed, basically 100% chances of how the burglary in the Dresden Green Vault could have been prevented.

Berlin police officers who had come to the Dresden trial as witnesses reported how, late in the evening of November 24, 2019, they had stopped a car in the capital with conspicuous occupants, the same driving style and the contents of the trunk.

“It was a conspicuous driving style”

Stephen Locke

Correspondent for Saxony and Thuringia based in Dresden.

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One of the officers told how he was driving that night when he stopped at a traffic light next to the car with four young men.

The police officers, a civil patrol, recognized them.

In any case, they would have started whispering frantically and made an extremely nervous impression overall.

When they finally drove away at excessive speed on green, the officers stopped the quartet.

"It was a conspicuous driving style," said the witness.

In addition, the inmates, all in jogging suits, were not buckled.

When the query of the personal details showed that all four were already on file with the law enforcement authorities because of burglary, the officials took a closer look.

In the trunk, they discovered a white plastic bag in the spare wheel well, the contents of which the driver did not want to show because it was only a car repair tool.

The officers then obtained an immediate search warrant, whereupon a crowbar and two bolt cutters appeared in the bag.

"It didn't make much sense to us to use it to repair a vehicle," the police officer concluded.

In Berlin, however, it was "not that unusual for someone to have something like that in their trunk," explained his colleague who was on patrol with him shortly afterwards.

"Brother, why is the police following you?"

That was also the reason why the devices, which are considered classic burglary tools in other areas, were not confiscated.

Instead, the observation of the vehicle was commissioned, it is possible that a criminal offense could actually have resulted.

At some point, however, according to another official, information was received that the observation had been broken off.

The crime, however, followed only a few hours later and 200 kilometers to the south, where in the early morning of November 25 diamonds and jewels worth around 114 million euros were stolen from the former treasury of Augustus the Strong.

Three of the occupants of the car checked in Berlin are therefore sitting in the dock of the Dresden Regional Court, as are three other defendants.

They all belong to an extended family in Berlin that is notorious for its criminal part.

The driver of that car, Jihad R., was spectacularly arrested in mid-May after watching the trial of his relatives as a spectator.

He is now free again.

An investigator who was commissioned to evaluate Jihad R.'s mobile phone said that after the check, he chatted with other relatives very excitedly.

"Brother, why is the police following you?" He was asked, among other things.

When evaluating the Google search on the cell phone, search terms such as "switch off security systems", "break through armored glass" and "hydraulic cutter" were noticed - all things that were used in the burglary of the century in Dresden.

The process continues.