Store boss denies €46m gem heist was ‘inside job’
Martin Leggatt said he would be “absolutely fascinated” to hear evidence for a lawyer’s allegation that he was involved in the raid on Graff’s in Mayfair, central London, last August.
Jurors at Woolwich Crown Court, in London, have been shown CCTV footage of Leggatt lying face-down on the floor with a gun pointed at him while a young female shop assistant was forced at gunpoint to empty displays of jewellery in the New Bond Street premises.
Petra Ehnar was then held with a gun to her back as the robbers made their getaway in a series of vehicles.
Aman Kassaye, 24, and Craig Calderwood, 27, who allegedly used professional make-up to make them look as if they were in their 60s, deny conspiring with seven other men to carry out the robbery.
During cross-examination of Leggatt, Courtenay Griffiths QC, for Kassaye, highlighted six other robberies on Graff’s stores from 1980. He raised the suggestion the August robbery was set up to enable an insurance claim following poor diamond sales and the fall of share prices in the credit crunch.
Griffiths said: “I don’t want there to be any illusions between us.
“I am going to suggest that this robbery in August of last year was an ‘inside job’ and that you were involved in it.”
Leggatt, who began working for the company in 1993, replied: “I would be absolutely fascinated to hear your evidence for that.”
Griffiths suggested the jewellers were “specialists in being robbed” and that Laurence Graff had “recurring bad luck”.
Leggatt said: “Thank you for your sympathy, sir.”
Griffiths asked Leggatt why the company that provided the store with alarms was not alerted to the robbery until after the men had left.
He also questioned why it took the security guards three minutes to press the alarm button.
The court heard robbers previously targeted Graff’s premises in London in 1980, 1993, 2003, 2005 and 2007.
The case continues.
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