300 million yen robbery

A man posing as a police officer on a motorcycle stopped bank employees transferring money and stole 294 million yen.

On the morning of December 10, 1968, four Kokubunji branch employees of the Nihon Shintaku Ginko (Nippon Trust Bank) were transporting 294,307,500 yen (about US$817,520 at 1968 exchange rates) in the trunk of a Nissan Cedric company car.

A young man in the uniform of a motorcycle police officer blocked the path of the car, a mere 200 meters from its destination, in a street next to Tokyo Fuchū Prison.

However, the evidence was primarily common everyday items, scattered on purpose to confuse the police investigation.

He was arrested on an unrelated charge, but he had an alibi; the robbery occurred on the day he was taking a proctored examination.

The case was profiled in 2001 on the show Project X, a NHK-TV series focusing on the accomplishments of Japanese of the Greatest Generation.

The episode profiled fingerprint specialist Uhei Tsukamoto's attempt to solve the case and another robbery.