Chaptzem Blog!      

In a heist straight out of Guy Ritchie's film "Snatch," a pair of armed robbers disguised themselves as Hasidic Jews to steal $4 million worth of jewels from a Diamond District wholesaler in broad daylight, law-enforcement sources told The Post.

Dressed in Orthodox garb of black coats and hats - and phony beards - the robbers showed fake IDs to a lobby security guard on New Year's Eve and took the elevator to the fifth floor of 2 W. 46th St., all while under video surveillance.

The brazen New Year's bandits then strolled past several additional banks of cameras, and were buzzed through two doors into Dialite Imports before drawing their weapons, police said.

Just before getting buzzed into the second door, the men spray-painted the lens of one surveillance camera, sources said.

The robbers then held up owner Atul Shah and another employee at gunpoint.

Shah was forced to empty the safe of all diamonds and jewels. Then, the invaders tied the two men up with duct tape before slipping out the door unnoticed.

They were in and out in less than five minutes, sources said.

A week later, the crooks are still at large and their identity is unknown, police said.

Aside from the $4 million in diamonds, emeralds, sapphires, rings, pendants and necklaces, the thieves also stole the opening scene from 2001's "Snatch," in which Benicio Del Toro and a slew of diamond thieves disguise themselves as Hasidic Jews.

There have been other imitators as well.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/01072009/news/regionalnews/oy_vey__what_a_snatch_149019.htm