The Perth Mint Swindle is the popular name of a robbery

Robbery

Robbery is the crime of taking or attempting to take something of value by force or threat of force or by putting the victim in fear. At common law, robbery is defined as taking the property of another, with the intent to permanently deprive the person of that property, by means of force or fear....

 of 68 kg of gold

Gold

Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and an atomic number of 79. Gold is a dense, soft, shiny, malleable and ductile metal. Pure gold has a bright yellow color and luster traditionally considered attractive, which it maintains without oxidizing in air or water. Chemically, gold is a...

 bars at the Perth Mint

Perth Mint

The Perth Mint is Australia's oldest currently operating mint ....

 in Western Australia

Western Australia

Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...

 on 22 June 1982. The bullion was valued at A$653,000 at that time.

According to police at the time, three brothers, Ray, Peter and Brian Mickelberg, orchestrated the swindle. The three went to trial and were found guilty of the conspiracy and sentenced in 1983 to twenty, sixteen and twelve years in jail

Prison

A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...

 respectively.

All three convictions were overturned in 2004. To date the case remains unsolved and continues to be fought by the Mickelbergs who maintain their innocence and allege a conspiracy by the Western Australia Police

Western Australia Police

The Western Australia Police services an area of 2.5 million square kilometres, the world's largest non-federated area of jurisdiction. In 2008, its 7,526 employees included 5,647 police officers.-History:-Early history:...

 to frame them.

The Mickelberg brothers

Soon after the robbery police investigations focused on the Mickelberg brothers. According to the police, the brothers stole cheques from a Perth building society and then fooled the mint into accepting those cheques in exchange for gold bullion, which it was alleged, the brothers had a courier pick up. The gold was picked up by a security company who delivered it to an office in Perth and then to Jandakot Airport

Jandakot Airport

Jandakot Airport is an Australian general aviation airport located in Jandakot, Western Australia. Jandakot airport opened in 1963. From 1 July 1998, Jandakot Airport Holdings purchased a 50-year lease with a 49-year option to operate and maintain the airport including its conservation...

, from where it seemingly disappeared.

In a separate matter, in September 1982 the three brothers, their parents and another man Brian Pozzi were charged over a swindle relating to a manufactured gold nugget known as the "Yellow Rose of Texas". Perth Businessman Alan Bond

Alan Bond (businessman)

Alan Bond is an Australian businessman noted for his criminal convictions and high-profile business dealings, including what was at the time the biggest corporate collapse in Australian history. Bond was born in the Hammersmith district of London, England, and emigrated to Australia with his...

 had purchased the nugget for $350,000 in November 1980. It was later found to be worth less than $150,000 and Raymond Mickelberg and Brian Pozzi pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to fraud at their June 1984 trial.

After serving nine months of his jail term and having his conviction overturned on appeal, Brian was released from jail but died in a light airplane air crash on 27 February 1986 when the twin-engine plane he was flying ran out of fuel on the outskirts of Perth. Whilst in prison, Ray and Peter embarked on a series of seven appeals against their convictions, essentially on the grounds that their confessions had been fabricated by police investigators. Ray and Peter served eight and six years of their sentences respectively before being released on parole

Parole

Parole may have different meanings depending on the field and judiciary system. All of the meanings originated from the French parole . Following its use in late-resurrected Anglo-French chivalric practice, the term became associated with the release of prisoners based on prisoners giving their...

.

In a bizarre twist, in 1989, 55 kg of gold pellets, presumed to have been from the swindle, were found outside the gates of TVW-7

TVW-7

TVW is a television station broadcasting in Perth, Western Australia, wholly owned by the Seven Network. It was the first television station in Western Australia, commencing service on 16 October 1959. It broadcasts analogue on VHF 7 and digital on VHF 6 from Bickley located in the Perth Hills...

 (currently Channel Seven Perth), a Perth television station, with a note addressed to one of the station's reporters - Alison Fan, protesting the Mickelberg's innocence and claiming that a prominent Perth businessman was behind the swindle.

In 2002, midway through a State Royal Commission into police corruption, a retired police officer who had been at the centre of the case and who was present at the interviews with the Mickelbergs, Tony Lewandowski, made a confession of his involvement in fabricating evidence which was used to help frame the brothers. He was subsequently charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice

Perverting the course of justice

Perverting the course of justice, in English, Canadian , and Irish law, is a criminal offence in which someone prevents justice from being served on himself or on another party...

, making false statements, fabricating evidence

Evidence

Evidence in its broadest sense includes everything that is used to determine or demonstrate the truth of an assertion. Giving or procuring evidence is the process of using those things that are either presumed to be true, or were themselves proven via evidence, to demonstrate an assertion's truth...

 and perjury

Perjury

Perjury, also known as forswearing, is the willful act of swearing a false oath or affirmation to tell the truth, whether spoken or in writing, concerning matters material to a judicial proceeding. That is, the witness falsely promises to tell the truth about matters which affect the outcome of the...

. In May 2004, just before facing trial, Lewandowski committed suicide

Suicide

Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...

.

Lewandowski's senior officer during the investigation and the other person who had been present at the brothers' interviews was Detective Sergeant Don Hancock who was later promoted to head of the State Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB). Through Lewandowski's confession, Hancock was directly implicated in fabricating evidence in the Mickelberg case. In September 2001 in an apparently unrelated issue, Hancock was murdered after a car bomb

Car bomb

A car bomb, or truck bomb also known as a Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device , is an improvised explosive device placed in a car or other vehicle and then detonated. It is commonly used as a weapon of assassination, terrorism, or guerrilla warfare, to kill the occupants of the vehicle,...

 planted under his car exploded outside his home in Rivervale

Lathlain, Western Australia

Lathlain is an inner south eastern suburb of Perth, Western Australia. Its Local Government Area is the Town of Victoria Park.-History:Lathlain's development commenced in the 1890s when Peet and Co subdivided and sold lots in the "Victoria Park Station Estate" east of the railway station, with...

, killing him and a friend Lou Lewis.

In July 2004 the Western Australian Court of Criminal Appeal quashed the brothers' convictions after seven unsuccessful attempts. The judge ruled that with the suppression of their sentence, they were entitled to a presumption of innocence. The Assistant Police Commissioner, Mel Hay, expressed disappointment with the decision which prompted a threat of a defamation lawsuit

Lawsuit

A lawsuit or "suit in law" is a civil action brought in a court of law in which a plaintiff, a party who claims to have incurred loss as a result of a defendant's actions, demands a legal or equitable remedy. The defendant is required to respond to the plaintiff's complaint...

 from the brothers. The brothers subsequently sued the Western Australian government for libel, and as part of the settlement, the West Australian police issued a public apology in December 2007.

After lodging claims for compensation, in January 2008 State Attorney-General Jim McGinty

Jim McGinty

James Andrew McGinty is an Australian politician. He was a Labor member of the Western Australian Legislative Assembly from 1990 to 2009, representing the district of Fremantle. He was Labor Party leader and Leader of the Opposition from 1994 to 1996...

 offered $500,000 in ex-gratia payments to each brother for the "injustice done to them". The payment followed $658,672 paid to cover legal costs of their two appeals. The Mickelbergs' lawyer had asked for $950,000 in compensation for Ray and $750,000 for Peter.

A book about the case

Author Avon Lovell wrote a book about the case in 1985 — The Mickelberg Stitch in which he described questionable investigation practices by the Western Australian Police Force and made allegations of unsigned confessions and a forged fingerprint

Fingerprint

A fingerprint in its narrow sense is an impression left by the friction ridges of a human finger. In a wider use of the term, fingerprints are the traces of an impression from the friction ridges of any part of a human hand. A print from the foot can also leave an impression of friction ridges...

. The police union collected a levy of $1 per week from each member to fund legal action against Lovell and his publishers and distributors to suppress publication of the book. It was estimated that between one and two million dollars was raised. The book was banned by the State Government, but was still freely available to be read at the J S Battye Library

J S Battye Library

The J S Battye Library is an arm of the State Library of Western Australia...

. The ban was eventually lifted.

A second book by Lovell, Split Image, was published in 1990 and met a similar fate to the Mickelberg Stitch. This ban was also lifted later.

In March 2011, Lovell launched his third and final book on the case, under the title Litany of Lies.