Hatton Garden heist: New images reveal vault devastated by £14m 'Dad's Army' raid

The elderly gang and their cronies managed to drill a hole 20ins deep, 10ins high and 18ins wide into the wall of an underground vault at the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Ltd.

The raiders, dubbed the 'Dad's Army' gang, ransacked 73 safety deposit boxes over the Easter bank holiday weekend last year.

They made off with valuables worth up to £14million, including gold, diamonds and sapphires - but two thirds of the valuables have still not been recovered.

Although the final three out of seven admitted their part in the heist this week it does not mean the nightmare of the robbery - which took three years to plan - is over for the owners of the company, or those whose items remain missing.

Pictures released today reveal the utter destruction the robbery caused, with a ghostly room full of smashed safety deposit boxes still standing empty, doors carelessly flung open.

The massive hole the group, aged 48 to 76, bored through has been filled in but its presence is still a painful reminder of the millions of pounds thieved from a room of presumed safety.

Double locks on the small boxes can been seen smashed to smithereens, many which contained loose diamonds belonging to the multitudes of jewellers in the country's prime jewellery area.

And a green crow bar is ominously perched on top of a box in the safe deposit room as a difficult reminder of how the thieves got their hands on the contents.

Papers, worthless to the elderly thieves, are strewn all over the floor.

Some members of the gang were seen on CCTV unloading tools from a white van on April 2 outside the building but they could not get into the vault as it was blocked off by a metal cabinet.

After three years of planning, often in the Castle Pub on Pentonville Road, Islington, the group was not going to give up and returned two night later with more equipment to finish the job.

They gained access and used the lift shaft to get into the basement, disabled the alarm and bored through the vault wall.

CCTV footage eventually shows them coming out of the building with bags and wheelie bins stacked up with stolen goods.

The group were finally arrested after police bugged their cars where they were heard bragging about the heist.

Three of the "brazen burglars" were convicted on Thursday, while four "ringleaders" had already pleaded guilty, two more were convicted earlier in connection with criminal property offences, and one was cleared of his part in the heist after eight months in custody.

Scotland Yard's Detective Superintendent Craig Turner, said: "The weight of evidence was so strong that half the gang chose to plead guilty.

"It was an audacious, brazen burglary that was some three years in the planning."

Police are now offering a £20,000 reward for information about another man, known only as Basil, which leads to his arrest and conviction.

He is thought to have let the others into the Hatton Garden building by opening the fire escape from inside.

Reviewing lawyer Ed Hall from the Crown Prosecution Service said: "The four main ringleaders, a close-knit group of experienced criminals, some of whom had been involved in other high-value crimes, pleaded guilty after realising the strength of the case against them.

"As a result of this trial, three other men who played significant roles, including the moving and concealing the stolen gold and jewels, have also been convicted."

Prosecutor Philip Evans told the jury: "These four ringleaders and organisers of this conspiracy, although senior in years, brought with them a great deal of experience in planning and executing sophisticated and serious acquisitive crime not dissimilar to this.

"This offence was to be the largest burglary in English legal history."

No forensic trace was left at the vault by the gang, but police found a number of stolen goods during house searches as well as a copy of Forensics For Dummies at Jones's house and a book on the diamond underworld at Reader's home.

All seven are expected to be sentenced on March 7.

It can also now be reported Perkins' daughter, Terri Robinson, 35, of Sterling Road, Enfield, is also facing jail time after pleading guilty to concealing, converting or transferring criminal property.

Her brother-in-law, Brenn Walters, 43, also known as Ben Perkins, admitted the same offence.