KEY POINTS:
The success so far of the war medal thieves has signalled the arrival of a new kind of criminal modus operandi - taking artefacts and holding them for ransom.
The glamorous scenario of the medals being stolen to order and smuggled overseas is no more. The ugly reality is that the thieves are organised locals after the Herald revealed the apparent ease with which imprisoned gang figure Daniel William Crichton was able to negotiate with them.
The medal theft came just six weeks after police caved in to the demands of an accused criminal - whose identity is covered by a suppression order - for the return of a Goldie painting taken in a copycat crime. Both cases involved priceless artefacts surrounded by poor security that an experienced thief could easily breach.
A criminal would only steal something they couldn't sell if the payment could be extracted in some other way.
Such ransom-style crimes are unusual but not unheard of.
They do happen with high-end motor vehicles or the like where criminals can't use the black market.
An intermediary will approach the owners, who are happy to pay a price to get them back in one piece, even if it is just to protect insurance premiums.
Deals like this, and publicity about them, are frowned upon by police fearing the precedent that could be set.
The theft of artefacts with nationwide sentimentality raises the stakes to a new level.
The negotiators have had police bending so far over backwards they have got leverage in their court cases.
In the medals case the payout process was made much easier with private donors putting up a $300,000 reward - six times the value of what police usually put up for their coldest murder cases.
The United States famously does not negotiate with terrorists.
The police here would have desperately wanted to avoid caving in to the thieves but the medals meant so much they had little choice.
They will now be just as desperately hoping to follow the money to the thieves.
* Herald investigative reporter Patrick Gower has reported on gang and organised crime in New Zealand and in the UK for Jane's Police Review.
