The theft
In the night of Saturday 2 to Sunday 3 January 1943, well after curfew, the men cycle to the Town Hall. Van Roekel and Van der Wal keep watch at the front of the building. At the rear, Mebius and Sijnja smash a window of the former wedding hall and climb inside. Mebius lets the other two into the building through a side door. They also park the bicyles inside, out of sight.

Mebius knows where the key to the cabinet with personal data is being kept, but to make it look like an ordinary burglary they turn over all the desk drawers, as if someone has been looking for the key.

The men empty the contents of the drawers into large burlap sacks. When it is safe Sijnja goes out first and hides behind a pile of stones near the church (the church is under reconstruction). The other three wait in the hallway. It is curfew, but they know the time schedule of the police’s checks. When Sijnja signals ‘all clear’, Van der Wal and Van Roekel leave the building with the burlap sacks and the bicycles.

Mebius stays behind to lock the door again. He climbs through the window and over the wall and joins the others. With the burlap sacks full of identity cards on the back of their bicycles, they then ride down the dike to the Wolfswaard. It starts to snow lightly, but luckily for the men not to the extent that the bicycle tracks are visible.

They hide the loot in a hole underneath the chicken coop at the back of the Wolfswaard’s orchard.

Threat
On January 4, 1943, the Town Hall reopens its doors again for daily business. The burglary and the missing cards are discovered. The Wageningen police and the Arnhem SD (Sicherheitsdienst) immediately set up an investigation. They are convinced from the start that the perpetrators must be sought among the students.

All professors of the College of Agriculture must report to the police station. A representative of the Arnhem SD threatens to close the college if the 'case’ is not solved within three days.