History Main / TheConvenientStoreNextDoor

* ''Series/{{Salamander}}'' begins with an ordinary street scene in Brussels, of roadworkers setting up one of those stripey modesty tents over a manhole. This is their lead-in to tunnelling into the vault of the next-door bank via the sewage system.

A stock plot in [[TheCaper Caper]] movies, where some kind of store is right next to a bank or jewellery store criminals wish to rob, so they will rent that property for the purposes of tunnelling through to their target. Sometimes, in more humorous examples, the crooks actually become competent at their front business and will eventually [[FakeRealTurn pursue that legitimately]] in opposition to the CutLexLuthorACheck trope.

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* An episode of ''Series/Car54WhereAreYou'' was based around an eatery next to a bank. A single scene at the end of the episode replayed the entire plot with the buildings' next owners, who were posing as stamp dealers.

* In one ''Franchise/DocSavage'' novel, criminals strike at Doc by renting the office next to his and attacking the wall. (This causes a few continuity problems for fans as most Doc Savage stories state that he rents the entire floor of the skyscraper.)

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* In ''Film/HenrysCrime'', Henry discovers a long forgotten [[SecretUndergroundTunnel bootlegger's tunnel]] which runs from the bank to a theatre across the alleyway. He and Max plan to infiltrate the theatre and its current production of Chekhov's ''Theatre/TheCherryOrchard'' to enough time to dig their way to the adjacent bank vault.

* In one Franchise/DocSavage novel, criminals strike at Doc by renting the office next to his and attacking the wall. (This causes a few continuity problems for fans as most Doc Savage stories state that he rents the entire floor of the skyscraper.)

* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Ultimate Spider-Man}}'' episode "Damage Control", the Wrecking Crew busted into a laundromat during one of their rampages, intending to come back during the reconstruction and break through the wall into the bank next door.

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* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/ChipNDaleRescueRangers'' did this bizarrely by combining it with a "shoemaker and the elves" plot. It involved a restaurant next to a bank, and the "temporary owners" suffering from mysteriously appearing bowls of cheese chowder that were favored by the local police. [[spoiler:The genuine owner had been sent on vacation, with the messengers offering to help out while she was gone.]]

* ''Literature/TheThinkingMachine'': In "The Problem of the Deserted House", criminals rent and old, abandoned house and, over the course of several months, construct a tunnel from the cellar to a bank vault (crossing a subway tunnel in the process), so they will have the secret passage in place with a shipment of several million dollars in gold arrives.

* The world's second largest bank theft, in 2005, Fortaleza, Brazil, used this. The organized burglars bought a building a couple of blocks away from their target, Banco Central, set up a synthetic-grass store as a front, then started to dig up a professionally engineered tunnel to the bank, with the store acting as a cover for all the dirt being moved, and managed to avoid tripping any alarms to the point that it was only the following Monday that anyone realized there was a break-in (the bank was closed on weekends). They managed to steal 160 million reais -- the equivalent of $94 million -- in the operation, and to this day most of the robbers, including the face Paulo Sergio, and the money haven't been caught thanks to said bank, at the time, having horribly outdated security due to the owners believing [[TemptingFate there was no possible way]] [[TooDumbToLive anyone could actually steal from them]], and failed to catch any of them on tape.

* Has happened in ''Series/{{Hustle}}''.

* In ''WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers'', Bob hires [[spoiler: a bank robber who once held him hostage.]] Turns out he was just tunnelling into the bank from his basement.

* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales'' involves the Beagle Boys setting up an ice cream stand next to Scrooge [=McDuck's=] money bin. [[CutLexLuthorACheck They're pretty good at selling ice cream]] and consider turning legit but ultimately try to rob the place anyway.

* ''Film/TheLadykillers2004'' has a group of criminals posing as musicians who practice in the cellar of a boarding house, while tunnelling from the cellar to a vault they intend to rob. (In the 1955 original, the robbery is a straight ArmedBlag, and the boarding house is just where they meet to plot the job beforehand and regroup afterwards.)

* The 2004 remake of ''Film/TheLadykillers'' has a group of criminals posing as musicians who practice in the cellar of a boarding house, while tunnelling from the cellar to a vault they intend to rob. (In the 1955 original, the robbery is a straight ArmedBlag, and the boarding house is just where they meet to plot the job beforehand and regroup afterwards.)

* ''Film/ShortCircuit 2'', the villains were doing this to break into the bank when the protagonists buy the warehouse. The villains first try to drive the heroes away, then trick Johnny Five into digging the tunnel for them.

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* The Creator/EdwardGRobinson movie ''LarcenyInc.'' features the humorous subversion described above, with the luggage-store front turning a brisk business.

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[[AC:WesternAnimation]]

[[AC:RealLife]]

* The world's second largest bank theft, in 2005, Fortaleza, Brazil, used this. The organized burglars bought a building a couple of blocks away from their target, Banco Central, set up a synthetic-grass store as a front, then started to dig up a professionally engineered tunnel to the bank, with the store acting as a cover for all the dirt being moved, and managed to avoid tripping any alarms to the point that it was only the following Monday that anyone realized there was a break-in (the bank was closed on weekends). They managed to steal 160 million reais -- the equivalent of $94 million -- in the operation, and to this day most of the robbers, including the face Paulo Sergio, and the money haven't been caught thanks to said bank, at the time, having horribly outdated security due to the owners believing [[RefugeInAudacity there was no possible way]] [[TooDumbToLive anyone could actually steal from them]], and failed to catch any of them on tape.

A stock plot in [[TheCaper Caper]] movies, where some kind of store is right next to a bank or jewelery store criminals wish to rob, so they will rent that property for the purposes of tunneling through to their target. Sometimes, in more humorous examples, the crooks actually become competent at their front business and will eventually [[FakeRealTurn pursue that legitimately]] in opposition to the CutLexLuthorACheck trope.

* The 2004 remake of ''Film/TheLadykillers'' has a group of criminals posing as musicians who practice in the cellar of a boarding house, while tunnelling from the cellar to a vault they intend to rob. (In the 1955 original, the robbery is a straight ArmedBlag, and the boarding house is just where they meet to plot the job beforehand and regroup afterward.)

* In the French film ''Film/{{Rififi}}'', criminals rent the office above a jewelery store and tunnel in through the ceiling.

** The TieInNovel ''Mr. Monk Is Cleaned Out'' has one when Monk and Natalie are temporarily working at a clothing store in a mall. Monk deduces that the security guards have been on their hands and knees because they are dirty, and when noticing a guard ask the owner of a kiosk to reposition the stand a few feet, he concludes that the guards will rob a jewelry store in the mall using a secret tunnel they have dug from a shuttered store next to it.
** "Mr. Monk And The Actor" played with this: A man breaks into a jewelry shop by smashing through the wall of the neighboring restaurant, [[spoiler: but the real point of this was to destroy that particular wall. The restaurant employed artists to sketch everyone who ate there and one such sketch depicted the man with the episode's murder victim shortly before he killed her.]]

* In ''WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers'', Bob hires [[spoiler: a bank robber who once held him hostage.]] Turns out he was just tunneling into the bank from his basement.