On the face of it, Toni Musulin and Redoine Faïd couldn’t be more different: one a quiet, skinflint armored vehicle driver, the other a flamboyant gang leader who went on the lam in Tel Aviv disguised as religious.

But the crimes of both men captured French hearts and minds, catapulting them to infamy and prompting some, in the wake of the global financial crash, to describe them as Robin Hoods. But neither man fit that particular bill—even if their money-grabbing plots could’ve been ripped from a Hollywood script.

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