A $9,000,000 Toilet -Stolen!?!
Yes, you’re seeing that! It’s real, it works (you need an appointment) and it’s 18 karat gold!
A Special Toilet Stolen
England, Woodstock - In 2019, thieves stole a toilet made of gold from Blenheim Palace, a famous house in England where Winston Churchill was born. The 18-karat gold toilet was an artwork called America, made by an Italian artist. It was very valuable and weighed 215 lbs (98 kg). If something is valuable then it’s worth a lot of money. The thieves took it in just a few minutes.
There are many valuable things in the world but we can all agree that the most valuable is time.
Their Plan
The palace is now a museum. A museum is a building where things that are important in history are kept. One of the thieves, Michael Jones, visited the palace before the crime. He took pictures of the building and the bathroom. He planned how to steal the toilet. He also looked at the lock on the bathroom door.
Hungry? Sorry, it’s a hologram and it will be moved to a museum because it’s a part of fast food history!
The Night of the Theft
Before the theft, one of the thieves was seen at the palace twice: two weeks before and once inside during a tour. If you visited the museum you could book a three minute appointment and use the toilet. The word book here means to have a space, room or a table saved for you before you arrive. In other words, to make an appointment for something. The thieves used two stolen cars to break into the palace at night. They broke a window and took the toilet quickly. When they removed it, water started to flood the palace. The palace is a very old and important place.
Isaiah wanted to book a night in the world’s most expensive hotel. He learned that he could only afford 5 minutes.
Selling the Gold
The toilet was never found. The thieves probably dismantled it and sold the gold. When you dismantle something then you take it apart. At the time of the theft, the gold was worth $3.5 million. Now the value is closer to $9 million. A man named James Sheen helped to sell the gold. He sent messages to two other men, calling the gold a "car" to hide the truth.
Some countries don’t have iron. So they buy old cruise ships and dismantle them to reuse the iron.
The Trial in Court
Three men are now in court. They say they are not guilty. The police believe they stole the toilet and sold it. One of the men, Sheen, has already admitted that he helped with the crime. In text messages the thieves would call the gold “a car” to avoid being caught. To avoid here means to try to stop something from happening.
Their local vampire must be at home before sunrise to avoid being turned into ash and his mother’s wrath!
Bonus: Today’s Idiom
For my more advanced readers, tell me what you think in the comments below. Firstly, why would someone make a toilet out of gold now worth almost $9,000,000? Then to give it away as a gift. Also, what about the theft? It weighted 215lbs so moving it must have been really difficult. Do you think that this theft is something worth “flushing your life down the toilet” for? Tell me in the comments and remember to use at least one of the vocabulary words you learned above.
The idiom “flushed down the toilet" means that something has been wasted, lost, or ruined completely. So the thieves “flushed their lives down the toilet” because now they will spend a lot of time in prison.
Quiz your understanding of this article by clicking the link below.
https://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/ugc/story.php?title=toilet-theives