LONDON, Feb 23: An armed gang who carried out a daring raid on a British security depot may have escaped with a record amount of cash, possibly up to 50 million pounds, a senior police officer said on Thursday.

“It’s at least 20 million (pounds, 29 million euros, 35 million dollars). It could be as high as 40 million, or even 50 million,” said assistant chief constable Adrian Leppard of Kent Police.

But he revealed that the exact amount taken from the Securitas main cash depot in Tonbridge, southeast England, in Tuesday’s raid would not be known until extensive forensic work was complete.

Leppard told reporters in Maidstone, Kent, that more than 100 police were currently hunting the raiders and that an unprecedented two million pound reward was being offered for information as to their whereabouts or identities.

All British ports and airports have been put on alert for anyone attempting to leave the country with large sums of cash while CCTV images of the gang’s white delivery lorry was released to help track those responsible down.

“We know this for a fact — this is organised crime at its top level. It was planned and executed with military precision,” he added.

He said Kent Police had the manpower, resources and wherewithal to pursue the robbers, vowing: “There’s no doubt in my mind that we will catch these people and convict them.”

The raid, probably the result of months of extensive reconnaissance work, according to Leppard, saw the depot manager and his wife and eight-year-old son abducted separately and 15 workers held at gunpoint.

The kidnappers, who forced the employee to help them gain access to the cash, were disguised as police officers while the others, possibly up to six, were said to be masked and wearing boiler suits.

Leppard said it was “an obvious line of inquiry” that the raid was conceived and carried out with inside knowledge and he was keeping an open mind into what happened. The money was a mixture of used and new banknotes.—AFP