The Helicopter Heist Ending, Explained: How are the Robbers Caught?

Netflix’s ‘The Helicopter Heist‘ ends with Rami and his thieving partners facing the fallout of their audacious crime. Despite planning everything down to its smallest detail, the group finds themselves in a sticky situation after a series of errors unwound their perfect robbery. Meanwhile, Detective Chief Inspector Leonie Hamsik showcases her skills by hunting down the robbers before they can abscond the law. Matters get particularly heated in Rami’s household, as his relationship with his wife Karin starts reaching breaking point because of his return to a life of crime. Even after pulling off a seemingly impossible burglary job, the robbers have to navigate the tightrope of fate as the encroaching police surround them from all directions. SPOILERS AHEAD.

The Helicopter Heist Plot Recap

Months before the heist, Rami Farhan, a family man with a criminal past, finds himself in a dire financial situation after acquiring debt with some harsh creditors. After the birth of his second child, Rami faces the difficult task of balancing a normal job as a restaurant chef while also providing for his family. Opportunity rears its head one night when Rami runs into his childhood friend and fellow thief, Michel Maloof. The two set up regular communication while Rami tries to find a way out of his debt. As it turns out, Michel’s new girlfriend, Alex, works as a staff member of the G4S cash depot in Västberga in Stockholm, Sweden. As such, Michel plans to rob the facility despite its reputation as the most secure cash reserve in the nation.

Rami’s debt situation gets even worse, with his creditors looking to make him pay if he does not clear his dues in time. Frustrated and running out of options, Rami decides to embrace his criminal past and participate in the G4S robbery job. He quits his restaurant day job, leaving his wife out of the loop, as he teams up with heist organizer Zoran Petrovic. The latter is excited by Michel and Rami’s plan to break into the building by using a helicopter. However, the ambitious plan can only succeed if they find a pilot in time. Zoran manages to land the right personnel in the shape of Filip Zovic. He recruits the man but unwittingly allows sensitive information to be fed to the Swedish police because of Zovic’s association with the Serbian ministry.

Subsequently, Detective Chief Inspector Leonie Hamsik looks into Petrovic’s involvement in the heist. He is also put under heavy surveillance at all times in an effort to stay ahead of the criminals. However, matters get complicated when Zovic leaves the heist team, fleeing into the night with his family. It leaves a huge dilemma for both the robbers and the cops as without him, the former does not have a helicopter pilot, while the latter is left with no one to provide inside information. Subsequently, the robbers restart their efforts to find the right pilot and land themselves the perfect foil in Axel Broberg, a marketing manager with a drug addiction. With him on their team, the heist finally has its green light to proceed.

The Helicopter Heist Ending: How Do the Robbers Mess Up?

Although the actual robbery turns out to be a slick affair, resembling one of the jobs pulled off by Frank Ocean and his trusted partners in the ‘Ocean’s’ film franchise, several problems surface later down the line when the crew flees the crime scene. The first issue happens when Axel Broberg, the helicopter pilot, disobeys his orders to meet up with two people and burn the helicopter before leaving on a speedboat. He panics after seeing three people emerge out of the shadows instead of two, as his instructions told him. Fearing that his life might be at stake, Broberg flies away and has to land in a forest, where he fails to dispose of the helicopter. It ultimately ends up in the hands of the police, who procure a boatload of DNA material from it, helping them connect the dots.

Another mistake comes to the fore when Rami discovers his bleeding hand right after the completion of the heist. He injured himself during the event, which caused his blood to be left behind on the crime scene, making him directly affiliated with the event should the police get their hands on the evidence. Afraid that they might, Michel advises Rami to leave the country and lay low for a while. This advice proves to be prudent as the cops inevitably manage to scope out the crime scene and alight upon the blood and DNA left behind by Rami. Therefore, the multitude of mistakes ruins what is otherwise a seemingly “elegant” and picture-perfect crime with no victims. However, it also showcases the fallibility of the robbers despite their experienced track record in committing burglaries.

How Does Hamsik Find the Identity of the Robbers?

Axel Broberg’s decision to dump the helicopter and Rami Farhan’s blood traces help Leonie Hamsik make tremendous headway in figuring out the robbers’ identity. Those mistakes provide the first clue, which Hamsik uses to dig further into the plot. It is also worth noting that the cops had already been following Zoran Petrovic because of the Serbian ministry tip-off. Therefore, a number of key figures were already in the line of sight of Hamsik as she started working around the clock to nail the robbers down. However, the detective makes a bold move by going against her supervisor and inviting a bunch of profilers into the investigation, who tap into the phone traffic network to identify the remaining participants, Michel and Niklas.

The overall probe works quite seamlessly despite Hamsik facing pressure from the top and also from the outside in the shape of the vociferous media. She takes a meticulous approach to her investigation and also ensures that she covers all her bases. This is likely a result of her facing huge scrutiny for how she arrested Stefan Hedklint in the early parts of the show. Because she had circumstantial evidence that did not concretely pin down Hedklint in his statutory rape charges, he managed to squirm out from underneath her. She also faced blowback via an Internal Affairs investigation into her conduct. Thus, her approach is far more streamlined and ruthless while uncovering the robbers’ identities.

Are the Robbers Apprehended?

At the end of ‘The Helicopter Heist,’ the walls close in around the five robbers as the police round them up in a quick and efficient manner. After Leonie Hamsik completes the entire length of her investigation, the cops swiftly begin arresting every central person involved in the crime, which comprises Rami, Michel, Zoran, Axel, and Niklas. All five attempt to flee in some manner or another, except in the case of Axel. The pilot is caught in an undercover operation while trying to leave the country for the Canary Islands. Rami is picked up by police in the Dominican Republic, where he has been hiding since the robbery. While stuck in the country, Rami also realizes that he is being watched by some other people, which causes him a load of paranoia. Thus, in some ways, he is grateful for being taken into police custody.

Michel is arrested while driving his car around the neighborhood. He attempts to flee the cop cars by giving them the runaround, but it proves to be futile as they gather around him like vultures and cut away any avenues of escape. His plight is similar to Zoran’s, who is picked up by the cops while dining out at a restaurant. Hamsik also personally shows up to watch his arrest, which brings a smile to Zoran’s lips. In the aftermath of their apprehension, the show details the fate of each character and their subsequent prison terms in a couple of ending scrawls. Rami and Axel end up getting the longest sentences, while Michel manages to escape the brunt of the punishment because there is no evidence pinning him directly to the robbery like Rami. The same level of punishment is meted out to Zoran as well.

Do Karin and Rami Get Divorced? Does She Keep Her Promise?

The final moments of ‘The Helicopter Heist’ shift the focus away from any criminal elements and instead turn it onto the narrative’s human side. Viewers are given a last glimpse into Rami’s tale and the future his family is left with following his incarceration. While still in prison, he is visited by his wife and his two children, John and Eddie, who have grown up significantly in his absence. Rami has a frank and emotional exchange with Karin, where it is revealed that the married couple have divorced in the intervening period between his arrest and her visiting him. It gives a somber and poignant feel to the whole interaction as it showcases the complex motivations that drove Rami to take part in the robbery and how he might have lost everything in the process.

Additionally, the scene brings to light the ultimatum Karin gave Rami earlier in the show, that she would replace him if he ever went back to prison again. Karin keeps her promise by marrying someone else, which brings another layer of tragedy to Rami’s fate. From the beginning, he tried embracing a new identity that was unshackled from his criminal past. However, circumstances and his internal nature pushed him to the extremes and sent him back into the same habits that got him into trouble in the first place. It highlights the deeper themes at the heart of the series and also the reality most people go through in escaping an identity that has taken over them like a disease.