All language subtitles for 1966.who.stole.the.world.cup.2022.1080p.web.h264-cbfm

This programme contains
strong language from the start.

What do you know about the World Cup
in '66?

Well, you all know that England
won it.

We stuck four past the Germans,

with Geoff Hurst
scoring a hat-trick.

And what about the trophy?

At some point, you must have seen
the Queen, God rest her soul,

handing it to Bobby Moore.

Maybe you know the cup have been
nicked a few months before.

You might even heard
it was found by a dog.

But if you think that's
the full story,

you don't know the half of it.

It just really is quintessentially
an English crime story.

You're entrusted to look
after the world-famous trophy

and you've lost it!

So many stories about what happened
are absolute crap!

Behind the scenes, there's a lot
more the general public don't see.

And my dad looked at him
and he went,

"What the fucking hell do you think
we're going to do with that?"

# Well, a young man ain't got
nothin' in the world these days... #

The story of who stole the World Cup
begins with the story

of the man guarding the World Cup.

# I said a young man...#

I was 20 years old,
I was a struggling actor.

I was in Monty Python,
which is my claim to fame.

Ring head office, would you, Norman?

Shall I go through Maintenance?
No, you'd better go through...

It wasn't any of these guys, though.

Here he is. This is John.

In '66,
John was having a great old time.

He's English, by the way,

he's just spent too long in Canada.

I was living in London.

I shared an apartment
in Knightsbridge with my friend.

He was a musician.

Everybody used to come in there.
It was crazy.

I remember one night, sitting there,
and I opened the door

and there's Keith Moon of The Who

standing there in a spacesuit.

And he had a star on his forehead.

He was a total nutcase.

John's acting career
wasn't exactly taking off.

So to fund his nights out,

he'd do security across the city.

Like these fellas.

They were always looking for people.

You wore a nice uniform,
did your security work,

made a few bucks and get drunk
and get happy.

That was what life was like
in those days.

In March, he had a gig guarding
the Jules Rimet Trophy.

The World Cup.

Which was on display
at a stamp exhibition.

Yeah, you heard that right.

The Jules Rimet Trophy was
in the Methodist Central Hall.

Because there was a Stanley Gibbons
exhibition of stamps,

and they had asked the FA
if they could use the trophy

as an exhibit to attract people.

The Penny Black stamps were worth
millions of pounds.

Hugely valuable. And the cup is not
really worth very much.

The security company that was
supposed to be in charge

of looking after the trophy
was called Alsa-Guard.

Their USP was that they had
Alsatian dogs

as part of their security detail.

Alsa-Guard Services,
whose motto is an alert Alsatian...

But for some reason, they weren't
allowed to use any Alsatians

in the Methodist Central Hall.

I don't know, dogs were banned.

Now, John, without his pooch,
had started there on the Friday.

On the Sunday,
the exhibition was shut,

but religious types
could still get into the church.

This hall had hosted
suffragette rallies

and speeches by the likes of
Winston Churchill.

And it was about to stage
another historic event.

24th March, 1966, I came into work.

The actual job was to just
walk around the hall,

downstairs, upstairs,

check the doors were secure.

It was very basic, very relaxed.

One of the conditions was that
weekends, when the place was closed,

this cup had to stay where it was,
on the plinth.

Couldn't be put away in a safe.
Had to stay right there.

I came in and the two old guys
who were already there,

old-timers,
sitting there drinking their tea,

talking about the last war.

Anyway, so I reported to him
and he sent me downstairs

to the Post Office's
Penny Black stamps.

We wandered around this basement,
and finally, at about 12:00,

I went upstairs and I asked these
guys, "Do you mind if we swap over?"

So I came out to do my inspection
of the hall.

So I went across
to where the cup was,

and lo and behold, it wasn't there.

It was gone.

Empty plinth.

# No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. #

I started laughing.
It was it a...it was a..

I guess it was nerves.

So I went back down to the basement
to these two guys,

who'd just settled down to relax,
and I'm still laughing.

I said, "Have you seen
the World Cup this morning?"

And he goes, "Why?"

He was starting...
His collar was starting to...

And I said, "Well, it's kind of
funny, cos it's not there any more".

And he said, "What?!"

I said, "Come on. The cup,
did you put it away?"

"No." I said,
"Well, you'd better phone somebody".

Within ten minutes, it seemed every
copper in the city was in that hall,

as was the media.

The police think the cup was stolen
from its case here

at about 11:00 to 12:00
this morning.

This was an inside hall,
so it had swing doors.

The security there put the chain
on the outside.

So all he had to do
was undo eight screws.

Whoever did it came in
with a screwdriver,

and they undid four screws there,
four screws here,

swung the door open, walked in
and took the cup.

We were told when the cup went
in here

that the most stringent
security precautions

were being taken to protect it.

Today, somehow, they failed.

It was so easy.

On his third day on the job,

McLarens was one of
the first suspects.

I was there all day.
I mean, one person questioned me,

the next person questioned me.

They were just endlessly
badgering us.

And of course, they sacked me.

Now, if they were watching it
the whole time,

one of them must have taken it.

So therefore, they couldn't have
been watching it the whole time.

"Who put that chain
on the outside of the doors?!"

It was British stupidity.

It was Monty Python right there.

It could have been John Cleese
stealing it.

Er...please don't panic,
just hand over all your money.

It was quite the thing.

REALLY was.

What a time it was for the cup
to get nicked.

This was '60s London after all.

You could call it a lively place.

MUSIC: All Day and All of the Night
by The Kinks

Britain went through a huge
transformation in the 1960s.

During the '50s, it was a grey
period, it was consolidation,

and in the '60s, it was breaking off
the shackles of the war,

and London was at the heart of that.

Music, culturally, economically,
politically and sport.

There was a glamour
coming around London.

But it was a very murky place,
with, er...with criminality.

It was a time and an era
where the organised-crime gangs

were still very significant.

They were running the show
more like!

The Krays in the east,

you've got the Richardson brothers
in south London.

You don't miss about
with these fellas!

And then you've got your regular
villains all over the place!

There was more money
around post-war.

People could go out and buy things
that were nicer.

And at the same time,
that meant that for thieves,

it was a wonderful time,

cos there was a lot more
luxury goods coming in.

And along came the ultimate
luxury good.

APPLAUSE

The Jules Rimet Trophy was named
after the French geezer

who sorted out the first World Cup.

It already lived a charmed life,

spending most of World War II
under an Italian bloke's bed

as he hid it from the Nazis.

The likes of Pele had lifted it,

so you'd think that when it turned
up in London in January '66,

we'd look after it.

But did we f...!

APPLAUSE DROWNS OUT SPEECH

Whether they will leave it here
permanently

or just temporarily
will be seen in July.

It didn't go into the FA's safe,

it ended up in a strongroom
in central London.

And it would go around the country
on display for people to see.

A man called George Bird

was employed by the FA
to manage the cup,

carry it, look after it.

He was a silversmith,
and he would take it around

in the basket on the front of
his bike.

Sometimes, if he wasn't going back
to the strongroom,

he would leave it in his house
overnight under the bed,

and then just take it
to the strongroom in the morning.

Completely amateurish
and unbelievably-poor security.

It's not exactly a surprise

it got nicked from a stamp
exhibition then, is it?

And with it happening just
11 days before an election,

it had left the FA, police

and especially
the Labour Prime Minister,

looking like right mugs.

Politically,
it was hugely embarrassing.

Because Harold Wilson thought the
World Cup would be a big winner

for him politically,
for him and Labour.

He wants to present Britain
as a resurgent,

rising Phoenix from the ashes,
everything is going to be better,

and he's lost the World Cup

before a ball's been kicked
in the tournament!

And more importantly,
Ted Heath, his Tory opponent,

who was very dull,

was all of a sudden
able to crack jokes

and make political points
at his cost.

The real reserves are down to
88 million.

That's the result of 17 months
of socialist government.

And then I saw that the World Cup
had disappeared.

LAUGHTER

And I said to myself,
"Can they even have got at that?"

LAUGHTER

From the point of view
of the police, it's a huge deal,

because they're under massive
pressure to get it back.

They want to see one man
in particular.

They describe him as being
in his late 30s,

five feet, ten inches' tall,

slim build, sallow complexion,

thin lips and dark hair.

Security guard John
was no longer a suspect.

Now the police had a description
of a man they did want to collar.

So the trophy had gone, and
the police had a description out.

With an election around the corner

and less than four months
until the World Cup started,

this needed solving sharpish.

So in came the Sweeney.

As in Sweeney Todd, Flying Squad.

Cue Apache!

In the '60s, when I joined
the police force,

you wouldn't have known
who the Flying Squad were.

All you knew was
a load of tough guys

who would suddenly just descend upon
a police station

for a cup of tea and a fag

before they went out and did
whatever they did.

They would only go on a Flying Squad

if they had a good reputation
of being good thief-catchers.

Good thief-catchers
and living a high life.

Cos, you know, you got very close
to the line of being the villain.

The Flying Squad were given
that much rope to get stuff done.

Crime was a business, and in that
business, there were two firms.

One was the gangs,
and the other was the police.

And we know, because of corruption,

they did their own business deals.

A couple of days after the theft,

FA top suit Joe Mears
received a ransom note.

Dear Joe.

No doubt you view
with very great concern

the loss of the World Cup.

The ransom note said,
"We want £15,000

"or it's going to go
into the melting pot".

To me, it's only so much weight
in scrap gold.

To show that they meant business,
the FA were asked to leave a note

in Thursday's evening news
personal column

saying they were willing
to do business.

"I stress once again that this cup
is only so much scrap to me.

"And repeat, do not inform press
or police."

So, what's the first thing
Mears did?

Informed the police, didn't he?!

In charge was Flying Squad
Detective Len Buggy.

Buggy didn't need to be
at the top of his game

to work out this was genuine.

In with the letter was part of
the trophy lining.

So the message went into the paper.

Now, this wasn't the first shady
deal the FA and Flying Squad

had made that week.

Remember George Bird, the bloke
pedalling the trophy around?

Well, he wasn't just good
at navigating city traffic.

He was the FA's go-to silversmith.

And in a fit of shitting themselves,
they paid him a little visit.

George Bird recorded how
on the night of the theft,

senior FA officials and Scotland
Yard detectives visited him

and said they wanted a replica made
secretly.

They knew that he had all the
measurements and that he could make

something that looked precisely
the same as the original.

FIFA told them not to do this.

Explicitly, they'd said,
"No, you mustn't do this".

And the FA just went ahead
and did it anyway.

This was a secret operation
to make a fake trophy

that they could potentially pretend
was the real one

at some point in the future.

So whilst that was all going on,

Detective Buggy was negotiating
with a ransomer.

This Buggy didn't like
having his photo taken,

but he did like writing statements.

What happened next is in
one of them.

You can read it
in the National Archives,

but not on a Monday cos it's shut.

It starts with a bloke
demanding the cash,

calling FA boss Mears.

Mears tells Buggy.

It's now Friday, five days
after the trophy was nicked.

Buggy heads over
to the Mears' household.

And by this time,
Joe Mears has taken to bed,

because he's got serious heart
problems.

This is really stressing him out.

His wife takes over, and she says,

"I'll answer the phone
if the guy rings back".

And Buggy says,
"I want you to tell the ransomer

"that I am your husband's assistant,
Mr McPhee".

He does call again.

Mrs Mears answers, explains
that her other half is sick

and hands over to Buggy, AKA McPhee.

The two men agree to meet
in Battersea Park.

The ransomer is calling himself
Jackson.

So you have a man pretending
to be Jackson,

a man pretending to be McPhee,

meeting up to potentially hand over
£15,000

for the return of
the Jules Rimet Trophy.

Hang on a minute.

So the ransomer's Jackson
and the copper's MacPhee.

All right. On you go, son.

What McPhee actually brings is
a parcel full of paper, not money.

Just at the front of the parcel
are a few fibres shoved in

to try and make it look like
it's genuine cash.

But in fact,
it's just a bag of paper.

Cheeky...
MUSIC DROWNS OUT SPEECH

But it does the job,
and Jackson gets in the motor,

saying the trophy's
stashed somewhere else.

# Girl, you really got me going...#

They're heading towards
south-east London.

This area is well known to be a sort
of hive of activity for criminals.

Following them is an undercover van

doing a lousy job
of staying undercover.

Jackson can smell a rat.

But on they go, stopping
at Kennington Park.

And that's when Jackson bails out.

# You really got me
you really got me

# You really got me. #

Now, this Jackson turned out to be
a bloke called Edward Betchley.

Betchley was a former docker

who lived around the corner
from where he was nicked,

just off the Walworth Road
in south London.

Remember that.

Back in the '60s, this part of town
was rough. Stand on me.

Don't you think you can call me
dirty!

You'll get a smack
in the bleedin' earhole!

Camberwell, Walworth

and then, up near the river,
Rotherhithe and....

Bermondsey. It's packed with people
all living together

in little houses and old buildings,

all trying to make a living
as best they can.

Some not making a living at all.

Others helping themselves
to what's not theirs.

For most people around here, the
docks were the centre of the Earth.

Hard men doing hard work.

And some of them ended up
doing hard time.

And when you were in the sort of
pickle that Ted Betchley was in,

there was one man you
needed to call.

Written on one of the cell walls
was,

"If you want to get out of here,
call for Baldwin".

My dad was involved in the case

cos he actually acted for the man

who was accused of stealing
the World Cup.

Freddie Baldwin was bigtime.

In '63, he had represented
Christine Keeler,

the woman at the centre of
the Profumo affair

that rocked the Tory government.

My father was involved in every
high-profile case

that was going on in south London,
if not London.

A lot of the local criminals
would go to see him

because they all knew him. You know,
it was like a little community.

Everybody knew each other, including
the police and the criminals.

But even Baldwin has his work
cut out with Betchley.

The old bill charged him
with the theft

and were putting the squeeze on.

They know that this guy knows,

or knows somebody who has the cup.

So it's their only lead,
and they're going to go at it 100%.

The investigations into
the cup's disappearance

reached a flurry of activity
early this morning

when Flying Squad raided several
houses in south-east London.

In the area where he was arrested,

the Yard just flooded it
with officers.

There were 200 officers in and
around Camberwell and Walworth Road,

and they were going in,
smashing down doors,

pulling up floorboards, making
absolute nuisances of themselves.

So whoever had taken this cup would
be under even more pressure now.

Not just from the Yard,
but from fellow criminals,

because the last thing they want
is a load of coppers turning up,

smashing their doors down

and arresting them for all the other
stuff that they're up to.

Betchley denied nicking it,

saying he was acting as a middleman.

And to be fair,
he didn't exactly match the ID.

But he did say he knew where it was.

So if somehow, word could get out,

like through his solicitor,

then maybe the trophy
could magically reappear.

And then maybe Betchley
could get an easy ride in court.

I don't think my father would have
been involved in anything illegal.

I think he had licence to do

whatever deal was needed to get
the cup back.

He was acting for Betchley. Betchley
had been accused of stealing it.

That's what my father
was acting for, as his solicitor.

It turning up seemed like
an open secret.

Even the press knew!

As it happened, it took far less
than 48 hours for it to appear.

Thanks to a man who worked
on the docks, and his canine friend.

Woof!

It's probably all most people
remember about it.

The World Cup gets stolen,
Pickles the dog finds it.

I was just going out to make
a phone call to me brother.

There was a phone box
across the road,

so I said to my wife,

I'll take the dog out for a walk
while I'm doing it".

So I said, "Come on, Pix, let's go".

You know, every dog wants to go out.

A neighbour's car was parked there,

and he went over to the car.

He was sniffing around here
and I saw the parcel.

He's sniffing
this newspaper-wrapped package.

What the hell's that?

It's about that size, so...

Picked it, I felt it was
very weighty.

I pulled a bit off.

And I could see
the top of the statue.

And I looked back
and I seen, "Brazil '62",

and that's what sort of clicked
in me mind.

And, of course, you know,
being a football fan,

and front-page news and TV...

I went...

.."I think this is the World Cup!

On Sunday, 27th March,

exactly a week after
the trophy was nicked,

a mutt called Pickles
sniffed it out in his front garden.

How bleedin' British!

So Corbett jumped in his motor

and ended up at the
Gipsy Hill police station.

I still got me slippers on!

I only went across the road to do
a quick phone call.

And I just pull up and jump out,

push through the doors.

HE PANTS BREATHLESSLY

Bosh!

I said...

"I think I've found the World Cup".

"Hmm." And he's,

"Doesn't look
very World Cuppy to me, sonny".

After a few checks,
they decided that actually,

it did look World Cuppy.

And that's when the questioning
really started.

I'm being interviewed
and then it strikes to me...

Oh!

I'm going to be number-one suspect,
ain't I?

The summer of '66.

A golden time for any England fan.

The final of the World Cup.

But we're not there yet.

We've only just got the cup back!

That was thanks to Dave Corbett
and his dog.

But what tends to happen
when you hand something in
that everyone's been looking for

is that people start to think that
you're the reason it went missing.

No-one's contacted me at all
about the award.

Everything else,
but nothing about the reward money.

I told them what happened,
how I found it and all that,

but from going back home,

for the next two to three weeks,

they was round every other day

asking me this question,

"Do you know this person?
Do you know that person?

"Have you been here?
Have you been there?"

HE SIGHS DEEPLY

To be fair, you can see why.

Corbett worked on the docks,

just like the bloke in custody,
Ted Betchley had once done.

And they were both
south London boys.

But Corbett checked out.

And as a reward, he pocketed
over 100 grand in today's money.

Money enough to buy himself
a new gaff!

Lucky, lucky bastard!

And Pickles?
He became a national hero.

Pickles, the 14-month-old mongrel,
found fame

when he sniffed out
the missing World Cup.

But for the suddenly
world-famous pooch,

there's more glamour to follow.

He's been signed up to appear
in a film. The title?

The Spy with a Cold Nose.

The owner was lucky to have
that dog.

Made a fortune out of that dog.

Got fame out of that dog.

It was paraded around on TV.

Became the most famous dog
of its time.

Well, this is Pickles.

He didn't come
when his master called,

so Mr Corbett went to see
what Pickles was doing.

It's like Lassie
meets the Italian Job,

meets some kind of Ealing comedy.

It's just too perfect
for the reporters.

We love shaggy dog stories,

and it just shifted
the entire focus away.

And you stopped thinking about
the incompetence

and the daft things
that had gone on earlier.

All of a sudden, it turns
what was a disaster into a triumph!

The PM had thought his days
were numbered,

then the cup turned up
before the election.

What a lucky boy!

In the end, Harold Wilson
was smiles all round.

That little wave of almost
euphoria, relief, happiness,

which you want to go into the polls.
It actually helped him.

So joy for Labour and gloom
and doom for the Conservatives.

He came out with a 98-seat majority.

Bigger than Boris Johnson
got in 2019.

Pickles did him proud.

Around that time, Ted Betchley
was at Bow Street Magistrates.

Betchley was facing charges of
stealing the cup and ransoming it.

Back then, this could have meant
a life sentence.

What he got was two years,
with the theft charge dropped.

That lawyer, Freddie Baldwin,
must have done one hell of a job.

The British legal system
doesn't do plea deals.

Perhaps in the 1960s,
things were a little bit...

a little bit less black and white.

Perhaps they just wanted to get
a conviction and move on.

I think the reason my father
got him quite a short sentence was,

I think there was a deal going on

behind the scenes
to get the cup back,

again, because it was such a huge
embarrassment

to everybody all round.

After Betchley's trial, the question
of who stole the World Cup

was forgotten.

Life was back to normal.

Well, as normal as it can be when
England are about to face Germany

in a World Cup final.

The trophy had turned up and someone
was doing time.

Even though the time he was doing
wasn't for lifting it.

The Old Bill hadn't even spoken
of anyone matching

the description they'd put out.

But they ignored these minor details
and settled down for the football.

Police interest in the investigation
was suspiciously brief.

And once that trophy was returned,
they didn't really want to know.

You would have thought when you've
lost the Jules Rimet trophy,

the World Cup has been stolen
and the world

has been looking at you,
laughing at you, mocking you,

you'd really want to nail
who did that?

But they didn't.

They'd got the trophy back, they
weren't really interested

in anything else.

And I think they wanted very much
to brush the embarrassment,

embarrassing story under the carpet
as quickly as they could.

We got the trophy back,
now let's deal with that.

The purpose now is to make sure
it doesn't happen again.

You're going to have
to repeat that...

..to make sure it doesn't
happen again.

Now, that sounds pretty obvious,
but what lengths do you think

the suits at the FA, Scotland Yard
and Westminster would go to

to make sure it didn't happen again?

Well, let's see...

The final of the World Cup.

The cream of the world's players
battle for the honour

of playing on this arena
on this afternoon.

We all know this part!

England took the lead in extra time
thanks to the linesman.

He's called Tofiq Bahramov,
by the way,

and as a stadium named after
him in Azerbaijan.

But I digress...

Hurst scored another...

Bobby lifted the cup...

..and Nobby Stiles danced across
the pitch holding it.

What a time to be alive.

They then showed it off at a posh
hotel in Kensington.

Well, they showed off something?

That morning, a young PC and two
other coppers

had been sent to FA HQ.

We walked into the office
on cup final day...

..and on the desk were two boxes.

And this is the real trophy that was
one, he opened it up.

And we've had a replica made.

You're just taking it in, really,
you don't ask questions,

you're taking it in, and this is
what you're going to do,

we want you to take these two
with you today.

You get to the stadium, you give
the real one...

..to the stadium security...

And you retain the replica
with you all the time.

And after the game, we want
you to switch them.

You bleedin' what?

So those were the lengths the powers
that be would go to!

Jesus, Mary and Jimmy Greaves.

We stayed with the replica
throughout, in the tunnel.

We were standing by the side
of the tunnel

when the players walked by me.

That's what just took you over,
really, and you just...

..washed over everything
with excitement.

There was no plan.

There was nothing, nothing
like that at all.

It was up to you, use
your initiative.

It wasn't until it actually
disappeared into the dressing room

area, that then the decision was,
you go and get it.

So that was the case, go and get the
trophy out of the wooden box.

And I walked into the dressing room
with it under my tunic.

Luckily, dear old Nobby was
sitting there,

glazed eyes, bless him.

We'll have that, you have this.

And that's how it was, so I just
turned with the real trophy,

under my tunic, out the door,
into the car.

We'd done what we wanted to do.

In the dressing room and later
at the dinner and on the balcony

of the hotel in front of the fans.

They haven't got the trophy
they've just won.

They've got a replica that was made
in case the stolen World Cup

was never found.

I think it showed
incredible disrespect

for the players and actually
the watching fans and public.

It's an incredible deceit.

Any picture you've seen of English
players holding the Cup

after it had left the dressing room,
that trophy is a fake.

The real one didn't leave a police
safe until they added it

to Mexico for the next tournament
in 1970.

It's incredible, it's an
incredible tale.

But of course, it's not
the full tale.

The full tale means knowing who
actually nicked it.

It wasn't Betchley
who was banged up,

it wasn't security guard, Mclarens,
or Pickles' owner Corbett.

Who was the five foot ten
fella with black hair

and a sallow complexion?

More than 50 years later,
his identity

would finally be revealed.

# What's your name?

# What's your name?

# What's your name?

# Shooby-do ba-ba-da #.

I'm the crime editor
at the Daily Mirror.

For my job, part of it is speaking
to people trying to build trust

in relationships with people.

And slowly but surely, you can
sometimes start to find things

that have never been revealed.

I've been told by sources
the identity of the man

that stole the World Cup.

The source said that it was a man
called Sidney Coo, who came

from the Walworth Road area.

So that was what I had to go on.

I went through all the newspaper
cuttings and started going back

through the National Archives
just to look at the story

of the World Cup and through all
the police files, just to gather

as much information as I could.

The name didn't come up,
but Sidney Q's manner did.

Most of this story played
out in South London.

And where was Walworth Road?

Correctamundo.

It just added to my belief that this
tip off had a lot to it.

But the more I looked at it,
the more I thought it was true,

the more I became obsessed.

But even after some more digging,
the name didn't show up.

So Pettifor did what all good
reporters do when they get

themselves in a bind...

Resort to social media.

One evening I was sitting down,
I checked my messages

and there was a message saying
"This must be Sidney Cugullere."

C-U-G-U-L-L-E-R-E.

Cugullere, that is one hell
of a name.

When I did searches through
the birth records, I found

that he'd been born in 1926 in
Woolworth, that he was the eighth

of nine children, and he'd lived
in real poverty.

He'd been jailed in the early
'60s for stealing mail bags.

Released in 1964, so crucially, he
was free at the time and living

in the Walworth Road area in 1966.

A crook? Yes.

From South London? Yes.

In his late 30s in 66?

Also, yes.

This was certainly looking
like our trophy lifter.

Now, if Cugullere had nicked it
and Betchley ransomed it,

they must have known each
other, right?

If only there were something
or someone to show

that they were connected,
like solicitor, Freddie Baldwin.

So South London's finest legal brain
had represented both of them.

Coincidence? Coincidence my...

He was well known to my father
and my father had acted for him.

He was a regular in the office
in Jamaica Road.

He was always popping in for cups
of tea, so the whole thing

fitted quite well with him,
Cugullere and Bletchley.

All Pettifor needed now was someone
who knew Sid, and who knew

what he used to get up to.

Specifically on say the 20th
of March 1966?

With a name like Cugullere, it
didn't take long to find someone.

I open the door and there's
this lad standing there.

I said, "Hello, how can I help you?"

And he said, "I'm from
the Mirror newspaper."

He said, "Do you know anything
about the World Cup?"

I burst out laughing, my wife burst
out laughing,

so I couldn't really hide it.

And he said, "Would you mind
telling us the story?"

Sidney was my uncle,
my dad's brother.

My dad was called Reg and Reg
and Sid were brought up

on Walworth Road.

Times were really tough on them.

They started off stealing
at a very young age.

Sid kind of looked after my dad.

Sid was a... As he got his name,
Mr Crafty,

but he was the crafty one.

So did he pitch the bleedin'
thing or what?

It was my uncle Sidney Cugullere,
who stole the World Cup.

They told me they didn't actually go
to steal the World Cup.

If they were asked to do
a job for someone,

for a certain amount of money,
they'd go and do it.

So they went there to steal
the stamps.

They were going to weigh the job
up, see what's what,

where everything was, go back,
steal them.

Well, Sid picked the lock, spotted
the World Cup,

put it under his jacket
and walked out.

"Come on, Reg, let's go."

Just a spur of the moment thing.

As they got out of the place, he
opened his jacket and he said,

"Here, Reg, look at this."

And my dad looked at him
and he went,

"What the fucking hell do you think
we're going to do with that?"

So there you have it.

More than 50 years after its theft
and after a ten month investigation

by a Daily Mirror journo, we know
who hoisted the World Cup.

Sidney 'Mr Crafty Bastard' Cugullere.

Him and his brother, Reg, they were
pretty proud of that pinch.

I was about, I think, 16,
and I remember him telling me

and my mum come in and went,
"Reg, stop it, enough's enough."

And then he'd tell me
a bit more.

And then Sid would say something
and the story

sort of grew from there.

With all those bedtime stories, we
also know about the little trip

the trophy took while it
was missing.

After he stole it, apparently
he took it back to his house

just off the Walworth Road, where he
lived with his wife, Nell.

And he put it on the mantelpiece
and said to her, "Look, darling,

"I've got you this lovely
decorative cup."

The police think the cup was stolen
from its case here at about...

And then later in the day, the theft
of the cup came on the news.

The story goes, Nell saw it and
said, "What the fuck are you doing?

"You've just stolen the World Cup,
get that out of my house,

"you bastard."

Sidney realises obviously that he's
got himself into a bit

of a sticky situation.

And him and his brother Reg decide
to take the cup up to Reggie's

father in law's house in Luton.

And then apparently they're stopped
on the way by the police

who have a look at them
and decide to let them go.

Too hot to keep, they stashed it in
the father-in-law's cold bunker.

And after they find out it wasn't
actually solid gold,

it made its journey back
to South London.

And was dumped outside Dave
Corbett's gaff.

One of Corbett's neighbours even
spotted someone looking like Sid

a day or two before it was found.

Visiting an old friend,
was he?

He come from Walworth didn't he?

I wouldn't go near Walworth,
oh, dead...

Oh, no, oh, that's a no-go area
for us lot down there.

Yeah.

The pickle story, I think, is...

Is, yeah, it's a good story.

It's what happened.

So, I mean, lucky dog, but...

Yeah.

If only Pickles could explain
what went on.

But he's buried outside the house
Corbett bought

with the reward money.

He couldn't talk either,
to be fair.

The only thing he didn't
like was cats.

And that was his downfall.

Pickles met a rather
unfortunate end.

A year after finding the trophy
he's chased a cat up a tree

and strangled himself with his lead.

Poor bastard.

This dog changed my life completely.

He was...

He was not only a friend...

He was...

He was...

And, he give me...

..this house and my future.

He changed my future completely.

Sidney Cugullere died
in 2005, aged 79.

He even at a nice little Jules Rimet
style flower arrangement

at his send-off.

Sid always used to brag that he
was the first Englishman

to lift the World Cup, yeah.

During his life, Sid was sentenced
to over 20 years of jail time.

This theft set off a chain of events
more unlikely than the plot

of a London gangster film.

The whole story is completely
bizarre and just

unbelievable, really.

It was a farce, the whole thing
should never happened.

If you take it too seriously,
it would do your brain,

because you think, No,
that's nonsense.

You couldn't make it up, really.

Victory or snatched from the jaws
of defeat with a dog, Pickles.

So what happened to the cup then?

Well, after Brazil won it
for the third time,

they got to keep it.

The beautiful trophy went
off to Brazil.

And then in 1983 it was stolen.

During the night there was an armed
robbery and it disappeared.

And it's never been seen since.

Maybe we'll find out who pulled
that job off in another 50 years.

# Dirty old river

# Must you keep rolling

# Rolling into the night...#

Subtitles by Red Bee Media