BERLIN — The world’s second-largest gold coin was stolen from a museum in Germany on Monday by thieves who used some pretty old fashioned methods to get the job done. <br /> <br />The “Big Maple Leaf” coin is one of five pure gold commemorative coins issued by the Royal Canadian Mint in 2007 and is worth an estimated $4 million. <br /> <br />It was stolen from the Bode Museum in Berlin in the early hours by at least two thieves, who used a ladder to enter the building through a rear window, the Guardian reported. <br /> <br />The 100-kilogram coin was displayed in a bulletproof glass cabinet. The thieves smashed their way in with a heavy tool, possibly a sledgehammer. <br /> <br />The thieves left the museum the same way they came in, and then pushed the coin in a wheelbarrow down railway tracks toward a nearby park. <br /> <br />Investigators believe the coin was damaged when the thieves then rappelled down from the railway tracks and made their escape in a getaway car. <br /> <br />Police suspect the thieves had inside information because they somehow managed to evade all of the museum’s security guards and alarms. <br /> <br />The museum is refusing to reveal just what security it had in place, and the cops fear the coin has already been melted down and sold.
