How brothers robbed a bank for 1.5 million using a child's umbrella, and all this in the USSR

On August 5, 1977, one of the most notorious robberies in history took place. Two brothers Nikolai and Felix Kalachyan stole one and a half million rubles from the State Bank of the Armenian SSR. By the standards of that time, the amount was cosmic.

To be more precise, Felix was the one stealing, and Nikolai was developing the plan. The brothers might have been able to escape unnoticed, if not for one “but”...

Nikolai Kalachyan was born in the Krasnodar region, in the village of Borodino. His father had cancer, so all the family's money went towards his treatment. In the fourth grade, Nikolai decided to run away from home: he joined a gypsy camp, was involved in drug trafficking and robberies.

Nikolai committed his first major robbery together with his friends. They made a hole in the wall of the Sberbank building and took money out of there. It was never possible to catch the criminals. Nikolai and his accomplices soon squandered all the money.

Nikolai’s cousin Felix was born in the village of Kazanchi, Ashotsky district. He finished school, moved to the second largest city in Armenia, Gyumri, got married and became the father of two children. Felix went in for sports and even achieved the title of Master of Masters in artistic gymnastics. But he had no luck with money... It is not surprising that Nikolai easily managed to persuade him to rob an audio equipment store.

To rob the store, Nikolai suggested using his favorite method - making a hole in the wall. That's what the brothers did. As a result, they managed to take the tape recorders out of the store. It was a popular product in those days, which was sold for 15 thousand rubles. Felix sent part of his share to his wife, but the brothers squandered the rest of the money.

They got away with the robbery because the store owner did not even bother to file a police report. According to the brothers, the tape recorders were “left-handed”, so we can say that they were lucky.

The brothers spent the money they “earned” from the first robbery quickly, so Nikolai immediately began to think about what business he could pull off next. And then his acquaintance, a certain Zaven Baghdasaryan, gave him a daring idea: “What if we rob the State Bank? There is a lot of money in the bank, enough for a long time. One robbery, and then you can “lay low.”

Baghdasaryan worked in a bank and knew how everything worked there. He said that the ceiling in the vault where the money is kept is not armored. If you make a hole in it, you can easily get inside. The money is just lying on the shelves - come in and take it. For the tip, Baghdasaryan asked the brothers for 40 thousand rubles from the future “boot.”

This idea seemed crazy to Nikolai. Despite all Baghdasaryan’s persuasion, he flatly refused to participate in the venture. Instead, he began to develop his own plan... Every day for six months, he went to the bank building, watched the guards and recorded their every action.

He developed a plan that seemed to have no flaw. The men had to break through the wall of a neighboring building, which was closely adjacent to the bank itself, then punch a hole in the wall of the bank, enter the third floor corridor and go down to the second floor - into the vault.

Nikolai thought through the operation to the smallest detail, and it was up to Felix to implement the plan, since he was stronger, more dexterous and more resilient. Nikolay made a list of things that you need to take with you for the job: a brace, rope, gloves, a flashlight, drills, a folding crowbar, a hammer, a hacksaw, a chisel, five bottles of water and a regular children’s umbrella...

Water to cool the drill bits when Felix drills into the concrete. Well, besides, if you want to drink. And the umbrella is used to “catch” pieces of falling concrete. For a man with a four-year education, Nikolai was quite smart.

After Felix learned the plan by heart, the accomplices began to implement it. The date was set for August 5th. It was Friday. The brothers thought that in two weekends no one would have enough money, and they, in turn, would have time to escape. But life made its own adjustments: a week before the appointed date, Nikolai had an accident. At first they wanted to reschedule the operation, but in the end Felix went ahead with it himself...

He made his way into the building that adjoined the State Bank and began drilling into the wall. However, she turned out to be too thick. Then Felix went up to the roof and looked around: by a happy coincidence, one of the bank employees had just forgotten to close the window in the rest room on the third floor.

The man successfully entered the bank, made a hole in the floor with a diameter of approximately 30 centimeters and went down through it to the second floor, where the vault was located. He came back with two pound bags containing one and a half million rubles. It is noteworthy that later, during the investigative experiment, he was never able to repeat this trick. Apparently, the adrenaline in his blood helped him that day.

The brothers left no traces and fled to Moscow with their loot. Here they slowly bought government bonds and then exchanged them back for money. It seemed to them that this was the ideal way to safely realize their capital.

In Moscow, Nikolai met a girl, Lyudmila, and even wanted to marry her. He convinced Lyudmila’s brother Vladimir to take three thousand rubles and use them to buy bonds at the bank. With the proceeds, he planned to have a lavish wedding with his sister. Perhaps this would have happened if not for one “but”...

Most of the stolen banknotes were new hundred-ruble banknotes, which had recently come into circulation. Immediately after the robbery, all stores, banks and savings banks were instructed to report all cases of the use of such notes. And if earlier, while this information reached law enforcement officers, the brothers managed to escape, then this time luck turned away from them.

Lyudmila’s brother was detained, and then they came for Nikolai and Felix. By that time, they had managed to spend 100 thousand rubles.

For the daring robbery, the brothers were sentenced to death, and the gunner Bagdasaryan was given 11 years in prison. The Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Armenian SSR, Babken Sarkisov, tried to save the brothers from death. He wrote a petition to the Supreme Court asking for a pardon and commutation of punishment, citing the fact that the criminals were young, and one of them had a wife and two children.

The court granted this request. But the corresponding document reached Yerevan exactly one day after the Kalachyans were shot.