Failures, Bad Luck, and Mishaps

The four gangsters’ joy over their loot was short-lived

The damaged Porsche was abandoned in a parking lot in downtown Bad Leonfelden.(Bild: Jürgen Pachner)

The flash burglars who broke into the Freistadt gun shop initially grabbed more than 200 rifles, pistols, and revolvers and loaded them into their stolen Porsche. But they quickly lost most of it while fleeing and then had to leave the rest behind in their damaged car.

“A heist of this kind is unprecedented here, so we’ve sent inquiries to foreign authorities to see if anything similar has ever happened there,” says Christian Schmidseder, chief investigator of the Upper Austrian State Criminal Police Office (LKA OÖ).

There were four slender, masked men who—as reported—broke into a gun shop in Freistadt around 4:40 a.m. on Monday using battery-powered spreaders—triggering the alarm. The quartet apparently targeted only pistols, revolvers, semi-automatic rifles, and sporting firearms.

The perpetrators stole only firearms—no ammunition or other weapons. They also left hunting rifles untouched.

Christian Schmidseder, LKA-Chefermittler

Bild: Schmidseder

The criminals stowed their loot in bags, which they threw into the trunk of their Porsche Macan—stolen from a repair shop in Vilsbiburg (Bavaria). By that time, however, the first patrol car had already arrived.

“The perpetrators immediately sped off at full throttle; they didn’t even have time to close the left rear door,” explains Schmidseder. Two of the men were likely lying on the folded-down back seats, but they were unable to prevent most of the weapons from falling out of the car. “We collected about 80 of them; the rest were found later in the getaway vehicle.”

Four masked men broke into the gun shop in Freistadt around 4:45 a.m. on Monday.(Bild: FOTOKERSCHI.AT/Kerschbaummayr Werner, Krone KREATIV)

The Porsche, with its superior engine power, initially sped away from the police patrol. But in Bad Leonfelden, 20 kilometers away, the perpetrators likely careened through a roundabout at high speed. The result: All the tires were flat, and the Porsche had to be abandoned in the local movie theater parking lot. “The men then continued their escape on foot and were likely picked up later from their hideouts,” said Schmidseder. A total of 210 weapons were recovered: “I think we’ve got almost all of them back now.”