Art Hostage Services
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The Art Hostage team undertakes a wide range of services, including due diligence, collection conservation and management, risk assessment and security as well as legal issues, recovery and dispute resolution involving art and artifacts. Through partnerships with leading organizations, the Art Hostage team can provide a complete service for all aspects of collecting and protecting art.
Michael Flatley and his family were in their lavish 18th-century home last night as thieves broke in and stole a rhino horn.
The
burglary took place at the Castlehyde property of the Lord of the
Dance, which overlooks the River Blackwater in Cork, after 6.20pm. Mr
Flatley and his family, who spend limited time at the sprawling Fermoy
estate, were unaware of the robbery at the time.
The four-storey mansion holds many treasures, not least a Steinway grand
piano, a valuable collection of flutes and rare collections of French
and Italian wines but a senior Garda source said the gang stole just one
rhino horn. “They specifically targeted this item, a rhino horn,” the
garda said.
The house also contains priceless fireplaces and a library housing many
first editions including signed copies of works by James Joyce, Oscar
Wilde, WB Yeats and Sean O’Casey.
Gardaí believe the gang had the property under surveillance for quite
some time. About three years ago, gardaí intercepted a gang, believed to
be from Clare and Limerick, en route to Castlehyde with sophisticated
burglary equipment.
An Irish gang specialising in the theft and trafficking of illegal
rhino horns, is the subject of a threat notice from criminal
intelligence agency Europol.
According to Europol, the Traveller gang — which has links to Rathkeale
in Limerick — sources and acquires rhino horns through targeting antique
dealers, auction houses, art galleries, museums, collectors and zoos.
Rhino horns can reap up to €200,000 per horn.
Michael Flatley's mansion robbed while Lord of the Dance star played with son
THIEVES escaped with valuables including African rhino horns worth an estimated €400,000 after Lord of the Dance star, Michael Flatley, accidentally disturbed them at his home.The star went to investigate a suspicious noise at the north Cork
mansion at 6pm this evening as he was playing a computer game with his
son, Michael Jnr. and wife, Niamh.
He was shocked to see dark-clothed figures running from a wing of Castlehyde House.
The star drove up to the main road to try to follow the thieves but they had made their getaway.
At least four raiders were involved in the robbery of the north Cork property with a major Garda investigation now underway.
Almost a dozen Gardai were at the property within minutes of the alarm being raised.
No one was injured in the raid though the dancer and his family are said to be shocked.
Gardai and the dancer’s employees are now engaged in a detailed check of the house inventory.
The mansion – purchased by the star in 2001 for €4.5m – was renovated and refurbished at a cost of almost €30m.
The star has a hunting room in the property which included a mounted African rhino including its horn.
Gardai
have confirmed that the rhino horn was stolen but are now checking to
see what works of art, jewellery and books may be missing.
Gardai are now appealing for anyone who may have spotted suspicious activity near Castlehyde or along the Fermoy-Mallow Road.
They are also checking CCTV security camera footage from premises in Fermoy to determine the movements of truck and vans.
Pope John Paul ll relic stolen from chapel in Italy
Thieves ignored the collection box, apparently targeting the relic
Italian police are hunting for a stolen holy relic that contains the blood of Pope John Paul ll.
It appears to have been taken during the burglary of a small chapel that was a place of special significance to the late Pope.
The church of San Pietro della Ienca lies in an isolated spot in the mountains of central Abruzzo region.
Over the weekend, thieves broke some protective iron bars and forced their way in through a window.
They left the collection box, but took a crucifix and the
priceless relic, which contains a piece of gauze once soaked in the
blood of the late Pope - one of only three such relics in the world.
Members of the local cultural association supporting the chapel are distraught.
"We are very displeased by the theft. We have no idea of who
could have done it. The police are carrying out a search," said Franca
Corrieri, a member of the association, speaking to the BBC.
The Pope used to escape the pressures of life in the Vatican by coming to the mountains.
"This is an area that John Paul II visited often, with his
secretary and not too many bodyguards. We feel very connected to him.
After his death, his secretary, Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, came and
told us that he wanted this church to become a sanctuary," said Ms
Corrieri.
Dozens of police officers are now searching the area with sniffer dogs.
The relic contains a piece of gauze once soaked in the blood of the late Pope John Paul ll Update:
L'AQUILA, Italy, --
A Catholic relic containing the blood of Pope John Paul II is lost because thieves in L'Aquila, Italy, do not know where they left it, police said Thursday.
The blood-soaked cloth was stolen from a L'Aquila church over the
weekend, and the two teens arrested in the theft did not understand the
value of the relic or remember where they disposed of it, the Italian
news agency ANSA reported.
Police found the iron frame of the reliquary, the container of the relic, on Thursday and arrested the men. A third suspect is being sought.
The reliquary and a small crucifix on the altar were discovered missing Sunday
morning from the church of San Pietro della Ienca in central Italy's
Abruzzi region. The suspects are believed to have broken in through a
side window in the sanctuary, according to a post on the church's
website
There is no appetite for terror campaign, says top dissident
A republican parade in Lodnonderry in 2011.
There is no appetite for the ongoing campaign of dissident republican violence, a leading dissident has said.
Dominic McGlinchey Jnr, 36, whose father of the same
name was the notorious INLA leader before his 1994 murder, said that
republicans opposed to Sinn Fein’s strategy needed to “have a
conversation about the future of the republican movement”.
The
intervention by Mr McGlinchey comes as the latest in a lengthening line
of veteran republicans at variance with Sinn Fein who have spoken out
about the futility of the continuing campaign of bombings and shootings.
Several
former IRA men have given interviews to the News Letter in which they
have urged fellow republican opponents of Sinn Fein to desist from
violence.
In December, former prisoner Anthony McIntyre told this
newspaper: “Republicans lost the war and the IRA campaign failed and the
dissidents need to be told that it failed rather than be allowed to
continue thinking what they do.”
Richard O’Rawe said at that time that the dissidents’ “whole campaign is insane” and should stop.
Mr
McGlinchey — who has vigorously denied an allegation that he had any
involvement in the 2009 Massereene murders and has never been charged in
relation to the attack — told the Irish News: “I don’t believe the
appetite exists among the people. That’s not to say there is not
considerable support among certain segments of republicanism for
particular types of resistance but what is very clear is that the
appetite is not there for a full-blown campaign.”
He added that dissidents needed to consider if “certain tactics are holding you back from entering a new field of battle”.
MSO concertmaster Almond unharmed after armed robbery of rare violin
Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra concertmaster Frank Almond
The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra said Wednesday that concertmaster Frank Almond is unharmed following the armed robbery of a borrowed Stradivarius violin estimated to be worth millions of dollars.
Almond was attacked in a parking lot Monday night following a
performance at Wisconsin Lutheran College in Milwaukee. The thieves used
a stun gun in the incident, causing Almond to drop the violin in its
case, Milwaukee Police Chief Ed Flynn
said in a press conference. Flynn said police suspect the thieves
specifically targeted the rare violin, known as the Lipinski
Stradivarius. The violin is reportedly worth $6 million, according to
Milwaukee Business Journal news partner Fox 6.
In a statement, management of the Milwaukee Symphony said it is "profoundly thankful" that Almond remained unharmed.
"It was through a rare and generous gift that Frank acquired the
Strad six years ago," the MSO said. "Its theft is a tremendous loss for
the anonymous donor who was currently loaning Frank this priceless
treasure, a great loss for Milwaukee’s cultural community and the
international arts world."
Flynn described the incident as an "art theft" with the violin
valuable to only a small population. Officials from the FBI Art Crime
Team, which works with Interpol, are involved in the investigation.
The MSO said it is cooperating fully with local, federal and international authorities.
"Unlike other priceless works of art, the beauty of the Strad lies
not only in its form, but in its function," the MSO said. "We hold every
hope that it will be recovered and returned to its rightful owner and
the professional musicians who share its true beauty with the public
through the power of the music." Frank Almond Playing the Lipinski Strad Violin
Egyptian jewellery heist at Leicester museum kept quiet
Third theft at New Walk Museum and Art Gallery revealed
after Freedom of Information request, £90,000 spent on security upgrade
The New Walk Museum and Art Gallery in Leicester
A collection of Egyptian jewellery worth £40,000 has
been stolen from the New Walk Museum and Art Gallery in Leicester.
According to the newspaper the Leicester Mercury, the items were
stolen in May 2012, but the theft was not revealed to the public until a
recent Freedom of Information request. The thieves, who apparently
broke a latch on a display case to gain access to the artefacts, have so
far evaded arrest and none of the pieces have been recovered.
New Walk Museum's Egyptian collection—the largest in the
East Midlands—mainly consists of objects donated by the British School
in Rome and the Egypt Exploration Society in the 19th and 20th
centuries. The most expensive pieces reported as stolen are a
4,000-year-old pendant worth £15,000, and a £12,000 bronze necklace.
Other objects date to the Graeco-Roman Period (332BC-AD394), including
earrings and bronze bracelets.
This is not the first theft from
New Walk Museum in recent years; in April 2012, two pieces of Asian
jewellery were stolen, while in September 2012, three rhino horns also
went missing. The museum has now spent £90,000 upgrading its security.
Breaking News: Laughing Cavalier by Frans Hals, targeted back in October 2013, may have been stolen from Wallace Collection
'The Comet of 1858' by Samuel Palmer was worth £100,000
£100,000 painting stolen from Kensington home in scam
A £100,000 painting was stolen from the home of an 89-year-old woman in South Kensington following a courier fraud scam.
Police are appealing for information after ‘The Comet of 1858’ by
Samuel Palmer was taken along with jewellery and banks cards from the
pensioner’s house on Saturday night.
A spokesman for the Met said
the elderly woman was telephoned by someone claiming her bank cards had
been issued in a crime and she needed to contact her bank.
She
then tried to contact her bank but the fraudster had stayed on the line
and said someone would attend her address and collect her cards. They
also asked if she had anything of value in the house and the victim
mentioned the Palmer painting.
“Later that evening a man attended the address and took the painting, items of jewellery and bank cards,” said police,
“He
is described as a white man, believed aged in his 30s, approx 5ft
10inches tall, with dark hair and spoke with an English accent.”
Samuel Palmer, born in London in
1805, was a key figure in the Romantic art movement in 19th century
Britain, creating visionary pastoral paintings.
A major
retrospective of his work was put on by the British Museum and the
Museum of Modern Art in New York to celebrate what would have been his
200th birthday in 2005.
Man gets 4 years in art
heist at home of financier Jeffrey Gundlach
Financier
Jeffrey Gundlach was offering a $1.7-million reward for the return of
art stolen from his Santa Monica home. A tipster eventually led authorities
to the stolen items.
A man
convicted in the theft of millions of dollars of artwork from the home of a
prominent bond trader was sentenced Tuesday to four years in prison.
In September 2012, Darren Agee Merager broke into the Santa Monica home of
Jeffrey Gundlach, who's considered one of the world's top investment fund
managers.
Merager,
44, left with paintings, rare wine, cash, expensive watches and a 2010 Porsche
Carrera 4S. He pleaded no contest to the burglarly charge as part of a deal
with the Los Angeles County district attorney's office. He was facing more than
nine years in state prison because of a history of felony convictions.
Prosecutors originally alleged that Merager conspired with several others,
including his 69-year-old mother, Brenda Merager, the owner of an East Pasadena
audio-parts shop who helped stash some pieces, although charges were eventually
dropped against her. Co-conspirators, Jay Nieto and Wilmer Cadiz each
pleaded no contest to one count of receiving stolen property. They were each
sentenced to three years probation.
A pair of brothers -- 30-year-old Wanis George Wahba and 27-year-old Ely George
Wahba -- also pleaded no contest last year. Wanis Wahba pleaded no contest to
receiving stolen property, as did Ely Wahba to a charge of accessory after the
fact. They're scheduled to be sentenced March 20.
Gundlach had offered a near-record $1.7-million reward for the return of the
art collection, which prosecutors said was worth $3.2 million at the time.
Gundlach estimated the value at $10 million.
Gundlach offered
$1 million alone for the return of a Piet Mondrian painting called “Composition
(A) En Rouge et Blanc.”
All of
the art, including works by Jasper Johns, Joseph Cornell, Mondrian and Richard
Diebenkorn, was recovered. The suspects were arrested on a tip about two weeks after the theft.
Prosecutors said two people collected a reward, though the final amount
was arranged separately through Gundlach, who was unavailable for
comment Tuesday.
Gundlach was away on business during the heist, and his office said he was away
again during the sentencing Tuesday.
Stolen Censer Returns to Harvard Art Museums
Image courtesy of Harvard Art MuseumsAn
eighteenth-century Chinese jadeite tripod covered censer that was
stolen from the Fogg Museum in 1979 has been formally returned to the
Harvard Art Museums.
After a three-year investigation that played out “like a
movie,” according to Homeland Security officials, an eighteenth-century Chinese
jadeite tripod covered censer that was stolen from Harvard’s Fogg Art Museum in
1979 has been formally returned to the University. At a ceremony at Hoffman
Laboratories today, representatives from U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement (ICE) officially transferred the censer back to the Harvard Art
Museums, saying they were proud to “right a three-decades-old wrong.”
The artwork disappeared on November 26, 1979, from a small
Fogg exhibition featuring a selection of jades. In 2009, it reappeared in Hong
Kong, listed for sale by fine-art auctioneer Sotheby’s with a pre-auction
estimate of about $500,000. (The censer had been hand-delivered to Sotheby’s
Hong Kong offices by a private seller, who did not provide any documentation on
its history of ownership.)Before the auction, though, Sotheby ran
a search in the Art Loss Register database, and found that the censer matched the
one missing from the University. The Register in turn notified U.S. law
enforcement authorities. Based on recommendations from U.S. Homeland Security
Investigations and the U.S. attorney’s office in Massachusetts, the Department of
Justice granted Harvard’s request for the return of the censer this past September,
four years after it was recovered. (Businessman and art collector Ernest Dane, A.B.
1892, and his wife donated the Qing Dynasty jade censer, approximately 6½
inches tall and 7 inches wide, to the Fogg in 1942. Censers are typically used for burning incense, but because this
particular example is of such high quality, Cabot director of the Harvard
Art Museums Thomas Lentz said during
the ceremony, it was most likely made for ornamental use.)
Special agent in charge of homeland security in Boston Bruce
M. Foucart, whose office led the investigation, acknowledged that the recovery
of art is not something typically associated with his department, but said the undertaking
represents a growing collaboration between government agencies and the art
world. “Federal laws regarding smuggling give us the authority in taking the
leading role in investigating crimes involving the illicit importation and
exportation of art,” Foucart said. “This piece has been on quite a remarkable
journey.”
Lentz praised government officials as well as Sotheby’s for
working together to ensure the object’s safe return, calling it an impressive
collaboration “among institutions, governments, and the art world.” “These
government agencies played an important role in safely returning this significant
work of art, which means it can continue to be studied by those interested in
art history and culture,” he said. “It
allows us to paint a more complete contextual picture of late imperial China.
This jade censer, along with thousands of other works in Harvard’s great
collection, is an important resource for teaching, learning, and research across
all disciplines—not only [at] Harvard, but around the world.”
The censer will rejoin Harvard’s permanent collections just
as Harvard Art Museums prepares to open its doors as the newly
renovated Fogg, Sackler, and Busch-Reisinger Museums under one roof in the fall
of 2014. Lentz said that he expects the censer to be on exhibit within the
next few years: “It will finally be accessible once again to students, faculty,
scholars, and the public.”
Six men sentenced in Chinese art theft
But stolen works from Norwegian museum’s collection remain missing
By Hanne Cecilie Gulstad.
The thieves were caught on security camera walking away with works from the China collection
Six men have been convicted in the theft of around
25 works of Chinese art worth 2.5m krone ($400,000) from the collection
of Kode, Art Museums of Bergen, Norway. Although the men were sentenced
at the end of December to serve one to three years in prison, the
collection is still missing and the galleries that housed the works
remain closed.
Last January, two men broke into the China Collection at
Kode, smashed display cases and stole a number of important art
objects, while four men set two cars on fire elsewhere in the city to
distract the police. The museum was previously robbed in December 2010,
and 56 objects were taken from the China Collection.
Because the
2013 theft took only two minutes, there are reasons to believe the
thieves knew what they were looking for, the museum’s director, Erlend
Høyersten, told the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. According to the
art theft expert Noah Charney, interviewed in the newspaper Bergens Tidende, there is a market for stolen Chinese art among the newly rich in China.
The
China Collection was given to the museum by General Johan Wilhelm
Normann Munthe, who lived in China from 1886 to 1935. With more than
over 25,000 objects, it is one of the largest collections of Chinese art
in Europe, with items ranging from Stone Age artefacts to contemporary
works.
ROME: Italy's cultural police, who have taken a leading role in
the fight against the smuggling of antiquities, put on show a trove of
recovered stolen art in Rome from Etruscan funerary urns to Renaissance
paintings.
Dozens of works are being displayed in the presidential palace in the
Italian capital in a special exhibition also intended to show off a
police force that is called in to consult on art thefts around the
world.
The force said it has the largest database of stolen works around the
world -- with around 5.7 million objects -- and is planning to travel
to Libya, Iraq and Syria in the coming months to investigate cases.
“The turnover from the illegal trade in art is fourth in the world
after arms, drugs and financial products,” said Mariano Mossa, head of
the cultural police force.
Italy was the first country to equip itself with a special department
to investigate art thefts in 1969 and its headquarters is in a Baroque
palace in the centre of Rome that crowds of tourists pass every day.
It has 13 regional postings around the country. Painting stolen from yacht found in collector's home
Last year the police found a painting by Russian-born Jewish painter
Marc Chagall “Le Nu au Bouquet” in a private collector's home in Bologna
that had been stolen from a US tycoon's yacht in Italy in 2002.
They also investigated the shocking theft of hundreds, even
thousands, of rare books from the Girolamini Library in Naples that were
allegedly smuggled out and sold internationally by its former director.
Among the exhibits in the Rome show was an entire Etruscan mausoleum
found by builders on a construction site near Perugia in central Italy,
including 23 well preserved urns with scenes from Greek mythology.
“This is one of the most extraordinary discoveries of recent years in
Etruscan art,” said Louis Godart,an adviser to the Italian presidency
on conservation.
There is also a sculpture of Roman emperor Tiberius, stolen in 1971
and found in London 40 years later in 2011, and a triptych that
disappeared from Florence in 1977 and was recovered only in 2009.
A precious vase that was found during an illegal archaeological
excavation was seized as it was being handed over to a Japanese buyer by
a Swiss intermediary.
These works of art “were stolen from the public in an illegal,
immoral way for the purpose of enrichment,” said Maurizio Caprara, a
spokesman for President Giorgio Napolitano who hosted the exhibition.
Godart said the recovery of the works showed the police's
“competence, enthusiasm and professionalism, but also how our heritage
is extremely fragile”.
Godart said Italian museums “urgently” needed more security guards,
amid a rise in reported thefts during an economic crisis that has
slashed culture budgets.
The Federculture association on Monday said that the cuts were
“disturbing”, pointing to a reduction in the state subsidies for upkeep
of monuments to 75 million euros in 2013 from 165 million euros in 2008.
Private donations have also dropped during the crisis.
Thefts from churches and museums have meanwhile increased, along with
illegal archaeological digs, according to a report by the Legambiente
watchdog.
The exhibition entitled “Memory Regained: Treasures recovered by the
Carabinieri”, opens to the public in the Quirinale palace Thursday and
runs until March 16.
UWS and NSW Police come together to tackle art crime
A new committee hopes to overcome a lack of expertise believed
to be hampering Australia police from solving art crimes.
Police retrieve $64,000 sculpture by Chen Wenling stolen
from Sculpture by the Sea exhibition at Cottesloe Beach (WA), October
2012.
Dr. Pamela James, lecturer in cultural and social analysis at the
University of Western Sydney (UWS), wrapped up months of work late last
year with the realisation of a new Art Crime Consultative Committee.
Working closely with the NSW Police Force, the committee will tackle
the often unreported and unsolved crimes of a rather specialised sector
of the underworld – art theft.
Art crime is one of the world's most expensive criminal enterprises, ranked fourth after drugs, arms and and estimated by the FBI to be worth $6 billion a year, according to the FBI.
While Australia is low on the list of concerned countries, the
Australian Institute of Criminology estimated in 2010 that $20 million
worth of art is stolen in Australia every year. But lack of awareness
many art crimes in Australia remain off the radar and of low priority. e
That is all about to change.
Auction houses are not disclosing concern about art crime. Bonhams
Australia chairman Mark Fraser said, ‘Art theft in Australia is
remarkably infrequent. It's a small marketplace, and stolen art tends to
stand out very distinctly.’
But James said art crime is often not publicly disclosed, ‘Public
galleries often do not report theft as it could show their security as
being insufficient, and private collections may not wish to publically
draw attention to the value of their collections.’
The most recent high profile cases in Australia include the recovery
of $1.5million of paintings stolen from Sydney property developer Peter
O’Mara in a raid by police last October, and of course the disgrace of
dealer Ronald Coles, who was sentences before a Sydney court last August
for his multi-million dollar art fraud.
Blouin reported that in 2000 the University of Melbourne’s
Department of Criminology conducted research on the illegal art market
in Australia, but because of the lack of consistent reporting mechanisms
for art crime were only able to suggest that "both theft and fakery are
persistent problems in the art market of Australia".
James said ‘The art market can unknowingly pass on stolen or
fraudulent art and the criminal art market operates in a unique way,
rather different to the market for other stolen goods.’
She added, ‘There is no expertise in the NSW Police Force to help
deal with the crime while countries such as Italy have specific
taskforces. This Committee will help to equip the Police Force with the
necessary mechanisms, skills and protocols to protect our art market.
'Art experts, greater training and cross jurisdictional liaison in
the specialised area of art crime will all become more accessible with
the formation of the Committee which will be chaired by the Property
Crime Squad and include representatives from the Fraud and Cybercrime
Squad, the University of Western Sydney and other relevant industry and
law enforcement bodies.'
‘This is an innovative, internationally unique answer to the
outbreak of a niche, and often invisible, crime’, concluded Dr. James of
the Art Crime Consultative Committee.
The antiquities dealer accused in global art theft ring
The case reads like an "Indiana Jones" movie script. A New York City
antiquities dealer raids archaeological sites and temples in India,
Pakistan and Cambodia, and then smuggles the pieces into the United
States, where they're sold for millions of dollars.
According
to federal authorities, that's exactly what Subhash Kapoor did. The
64-year-old Kapoor is accused of stealing hundreds of pieces of art
valued at more than $100 million, according to James Dinkins, a director
of Homeland Security Investigations. That department is overseeing the
case involving one of the largest art rings. "This is definitely one of
the biggest, I think that we've seen in the world," Dinkins told CNBC.
Dinkins also described how Kapoor's team allegedly targeted sacred sites.
"These areas are very remote. They go in under the cover of darkness
with trucks and tools, and sometimes it's actually during the excavation
process itself, when they're discovering them, before the world even
knows they found them," Dinkins told CNBC.
"They'll excavate
them out and leave under the cover of darkness, conceal it on trucks,
move it around to ports of entry, and ship it around the world."
One stolen sculpture, a rare second century sandstone of a woman, is
said to be worth $15 million, according to investigators. A 1,700-pound
statue of Buddha's head from the first-second century is worth $4.5
million, and an 11th century Uma bronze statue $2.5 million, according
to authorities. Indian officials, however, refuse to put a price tag on what they consider to be priceless, national treasures.
Source: U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement
These artifacts are among items that authorities say were seized in an art theft ring involving Subhash Kapoor.
A spokesperson for Kapoor did not respond to emailed requests for comment.
Kapooris not a newcomer to the art world.
He opened a gallery in New York City, Art of the Past, in 1974. For
decades, he sold legitimate pieces right next to stolen items,
authorities said. Several stolen pieces found their way into museums
around the world. One stolen $5 million item was displayed in the
National Gallery in Australia.
Kapoor also sold and donated numerous pieces to the Metropolitan Museum
of Art in New York. The museum's website lists some of the drawings as
a, "Gift of Subhash Kapoor, in memory of his parents, Smt Shashi Kanta
and Shree Parshotam Ram Kapoor."
A Metropolitan Museum of Art
official told CNBC, "The Metropolitan received a number of gifts over
the years from Mr. Kapoor, and also made some purchases—and we are
currently engaged in researching the ownership histories of all of
them."
The National Gallery in Australia said in a statement
that it owns 21 pieces of art from Kapoor's gallery collected between
2002 and 2011 and that it will cooperate with relevant authorities.
More museums around the world are believed to house art stolen form Kapoor, authorities say.
Source: Facebook
Subhash Kapoor
It all started to unravel for Kapoor beginning in 2012 with several raids. Authorities at one point intercepted a package at Newark International Airport. The
package contained a stolen statue on its way to Kapoor in New York
City, authorities said. Homeland Security Investigations, or HSI, closed
in and raided Art of the Past and several storage facilities in New
York City. Authorities confiscated nearly $100 million in antiquities.
"We've
gone into businesses and taken them off walls, the lobbies where they
are displaying them. And sometimes it's even professional athletes and
entertainers who have a lot of wealth and money and can afford to spend a
million dollars to display an item in their home," Dinkins told CNBC.
Authorities including Shawn Bray, director of Interpol Washington,
acknowledge that policing international fraud rings is incredibly
difficult. "If you take a look at the Interpol database, there are of
42,000 items there. When you add up a value that you could possibly give
these things, the price is staggering," Bray said. Authorities estimate
several billion dollars exchange hands in the illicit antiquities
market each year.
Several pieces of additional stolen Indian
art—not attached to the Kapoor case—were returned this week to the
Indian Consulate. Consul General Dnyaneshwar M. Mulay told CNBC about
the importance of getting these national treasures back to India.
"Whatever their market value, they are invaluable historically,
culturally. So that they are going back is a matter of pride and joy for
our relationship," Mulay said. "It is very unfortunate that there are
still people that think it is required to be taken out, stolen, smuggled
in the international market. The problem is there are buyers and
sellers. And both sides, the supply side and the demand side, need to be
constrained, controlled, and very probable treated by the law," Mulay
said.
Kapoor was apprehended by Interpol in Germany and
extradited to India, where he's being held on charges of trafficking in
precious idols.
Joselito Vega is accused of swiping artworks like this
one before his bust in an sting that aired on the CBS reality show
"Brooklyn DA"
An accused art thief caught in a criminal sting that aired on a
reality show says he had an agreement with a Long Island mansion owner
to sell the swiped paintings — and the TV network has the footage that
can set him free.
In court documents that were to be filed Monday night, house painter
Joselito Vega said the caught-on-camera theft of artwork worth $100,000
from a Kings Point estate — including a small Picasso etching — was just
a misunderstanding that could easily be cleared up if CBS shared video
from its short-lived “Brooklyn DA” show.
Vega, who was arrested in 2012, said he was approached by Michael
Schulhof, who hired him to do some painting in his mother’s stately
home.
“Up until his arrest, Vega didn’t believe that there was anything
wrong or illegal with this arrangement,” Vega’s lawyer Timothy Parlatore
said in the filing.
Parlatore said proof of the arrangement was in Vega’s car, which he said was searched, on camera, after Vega’s arrest.
The lawyer said prosecutors failed to turn over the vehicle evidence, and CBS has refused to share the footage.
The drama played out over the course of the first three episodes of
the much maligned documentary series on then-DA Charles Hynes’ office,
which aired as Hynes was running for re-election.
The CBS web site calls the episodes “a high-tech undercover sting involving a famous art collection.”
Calls to the Schulhof estate were not immediately returned.
Vega, of Easton, Pa., claims he was duped by a greedy homeowner who
had promised one of the paintings, which was insured for $200,000, to
the Guggenheim Museum upon his mother’s death, in what the defendant
said was an insurance scam.
Matriarch Hannelore Schulhof died in 2012.
The recorded theft was Vega’s second trip to the house to do work. He
was “hired” again after an inventory first revealed missing artwork,
and he became a likely suspect.
Investigators set up hidden cameras in the Gold Coast mansion and set
out artwork to entice him. Vega was videotaped stealing another three
pieces of art, authorities said.
A spokesman for the TV series “Brooklyn DA” declined to comment.
Rings worth $180k stolen in smash and grab
By Patrick OSullivan
STOLEN JEWELS: Keri Mason, Napier Antique
and Jewellery Centre co-owner, completes a stock-take after a $180,000
smash and grab raid.
A brazen smash and grab netted $180,000 worth of rings from the Napier Antique and Jewellery Centre yesterday morning.
The
jewellery heist, which included rings valued at up to $4000, was
captured on CCTV cameras and police are also appealing for any
information the public can provide.
Co-owner Keri Mason said the Tennyson St shop's alarm system was not activated by the 3am intruder.
"There had been a report to the police of noise that was made and somebody walking past noticed the broken window," she said.
"We
came down and there was a huge hole in the window just above our
counter and our main jewellery cabinet was broken - that had 180 of our
expensive rings [inside it]," Mrs Mason said.
"On the video
footage you could see a guy in a black hoodie jump straight through the
smashed window, through to the cabinet where he loaded up all the
jewellery trays into his black duffle bag and jumped back out the
window."
The theft took just 35 seconds "from when he smashed the window to when he was back out the window".
No facial features could be made out from the security video "and he was deliberately slouching".
The average retail price of the gold, diamond and precious-stone rings was $1000, but "some were up to $4000".
"I'd know a lot of them if I saw them - there are a couple of unique ones," Mrs Mason said.
She owns the shop with her sister Raewyn Dailei.
Ms Dailei said: "It was all our stock for the cruise ship season and the busiest month of the year with Art Deco Weekend."
They were underinsured for the retail value of the rings and hoped police would recover them, she said.
"We
are seriously out of pocket." Detective Ross Alexander said police had
good lines of inquiry but were calling for help from the public.
"If
anyone is being offered jewellery and have any suspicions over its
origin they should give Crimestoppers or us a call," Mr Alexander said.
Despite the theft, it was business as usual yesterday for the sisters.
"We have to sell some more jewellery to make up for it," Mrs Mason said.
The sisters have been in business together for 25 years with only one similar incident.
"When
we first opened the shop 18 years ago we had a burglary where they came
in the back. Even the police said they haven't seen commercial
burglaries like this lately - it's usually domestic," Ms Dailei said.
The Peculiar Underworld of Rare-Book Thieves
By John Ruch
When officials finally caught on in 2012 to the looting of the
Biblioteca Girolamini, a gorgeous rare-book library in Naples, Italy,
entire walls of bookcases stood empty. Thousands of books vanished into
the black market, including rare editions by the likes of Aristotle and
Galileo. Some turned up with their library ID marks crudely hacked out.
Most are still missing today.
Nearly as shocking was the barbarian behind it all: the library’s own
director, Marino Massimo de Caro. A politically wired, self-taught book
expert, De Caro and his cronies—allegedly including a lawyer and a
priest—looted the library and destroyed its card catalogue to cover
their tracks. De Caro even commissioned master forgeries of an ancient
book by Galileo so he could swap them for the real thing at other
libraries.
In the peculiar underworld of rare-book theft, De Caro joins a
rogue’s gallery that features flamboyant eccentrics, disgruntled
employees, corrupt academics—even a serial killer.
While the criminal personalities vary, according to the elite
detectives who hunt book thieves, they all share something in common:
base greed and a knack for gaining insider access to the cozy, exclusive
world of rare-book collecting.
“It tends not to be your average burglar,” Bonnie Magness-Gardiner, manager of the FBI’s Art Theft Program, said in an interview with Paste.
“You have to know something about what you’re stealing to do it
profitably, and for the most part, [book theft] is driven by greed.”
The Art Theft Program is a team of FBI
agents who track “cultural property crimes”—the theft of art and
artifacts. Stolen paintings get most of the public limelight, while
theft of rare books or manuscripts remains an obscure corner of cultural
property crime. In part, that’s because it’s relatively unusual.
“The thefts are scarce in our business in comparison with other
trading activities,” Gonzalo Fernández Pontes, the security chair at the
Switzerland-based International League of Antiquarian Booksellers (ILAB),
said. In his own 22 years of operating a bookstore in Madrid, he said
only twice did thieves “in a hurry to make some pocket money” try to
sell him stolen books.
Pontes explained, however, that thefts can increase after highly
publicized book sales, such as last November’s record-setting auction of
a 1640 copy of the Bay Psalm Book for over $14 million.
And books can be relatively easy to steal. Unlike paintings or art
objects, Magness-Gardiner said books are “vulnerable because these are
items…a person can access and handle,” noting that the whole point of a
library is to make books available for individual reading. “There is an
element of trust in the [library] community,” she said—a trust that
thieves often exploit.
A classic case is Anthony Melnikas, an Ohio State University art
professor busted in 1995 for attempting to sell pages he had cut out of
books in the Vatican Library. Melnikas was well-known at the library and
a friend of its director.
“You can see how he used his personal connections and trust he
established over a lifetime…to commit thefts,” Magness-Gardiner said.
When a book theft does occur, the lack of evidence could stump
Sherlock Holmes. Even noticing the theft can take years. A stolen
painting leaves an obvious blank spot on a wall, but a stolen book
leaves an easily-filled gap on a bookshelf. Some thieves, like Melnikas,
just cut out the valuable illustrations. And rare documents are often
catalogued by the box, not individually.
“For archival material, the first clue we have it’s stolen is when it’s been advertised for sale,” Magness-Gardiner said.
Once the theft is noticed, books are still “special problems.” Unlike
unique works of art, a book is usually one copy of many in an edition.
Tracking down the one specific copy that was stolen is a forensic
nightmare; ditto for trying to locate the owners of books found in
thieves’ hoards. Factor in thieves who hack off identifying library
marks, and Magness-Gardiner says the detective work is “extraordinarily
difficult.”
An archaeologist by training, Magness-Gardiner is not an FBI
agent herself. Instead, she advises agents on resources and authorities
to help them track stolen artifacts. After all, it takes an expert to
catch an expert.
Pinning down a suspect is also more challenging than one might think.
The rare-book world’s knowledge and manners are elitist, but they can
be learned by almost anyone.
“There’s no list of experts,” Magness-Gardiner said. “There are people who are self-taught…who are quite expert.”
All these challenges converged in the infamous case of thief Edward Forbes Smiley III.
A well-respected map collector, Smiley ingratiated himself with major
libraries by donating maps to their collections. At the very same time,
he was hacking rare maps out of books in those and other libraries.
After years of unnoticed theft, Smiley was nabbed in 2006 in Yale
University’s rare-book library after a librarian noticed an X-Acto knife
blade on the floor.
The FBI still has books and maps confiscated from Smiley whose owners remain unknown. Last summer, it issued an unusual public appeal
for help and released photos of many items (including the photo above
of a “Chart of the North Part of America by J. Thornton”).
Other Smiley items were returned only after intense detective work
according to journalist Michael Blanding, whose book about the case, The Map Thief, is due out this year. Blanding told Paste that Smiley cooperated with the FBI.
“Even so, the recovery of the maps was a long, complex process
involving forensic research, including matching paper stains, library
stamps and even wormholes to identify which volumes maps were ripped
from,” Blanding said.
Trusting the word of a cooperating thief only goes so far, and Smiley is suspected of many other thefts.
“We may never know the full extent of Smiley’s crimes or recover all the maps he stole,” Blanding said.
Online databases of stolen cultural property, including rare books,
are used to catch thieves. But there are several different databases
with varying contents, and none of them are a one-stop shop for the wary
book-buyer.
Interpol, the France-based international police agency, runs one such database. London’s Scotland Yard runs another. The FBI’s
National Stolen Art File is also a prominent database, but it only
includes cases with U.S. federal jurisdiction and only lists truly
unique books.
The best database may be stolen-book.org. Operated by the ILAB,
it allows member booksellers to post descriptions and photos of stolen
books in as little as 10 minutes, with an automatic email alert going to
all members around the world. Books added in recent years include a
1589 Bible and first editions of everything from Winnie the Pooh to Naked Lunch.
The simple system works. One recent example: a couple used a forged
£12,000 check to steal a first edition of the James Bond novel Casino Royale in London, then they tried to quickly sell it in New York City.
“They were completely unaware of how ILAB’s information email system works, and this led to their arrest,” ILAB Security Chair Pontes said.
But the ILAB’s system is only as good as
its members. Among those charged in the Girolamini library looting
conspiracy, three are auctioneers and booksellers who are ILAB affiliates.
“The Girolamini affair is very complex, and it will take years to
have all the pieces of this jigsaw in their correct position,” Pontes
said, noting the booksellers have yet to go to court. But he insists
ethical integrity must be at the heart of the industry, or it will fail.
“We say that in our trade, ‘to build up a reputation takes the whole
professional life, but you can lose it in half an hour,’” he said.
The FBI’s Magness-Gardiner believes increased awareness and skepticism from book-buyers would help.
“The more the rarity goes up, the deeper you want to go in checking,”
she said. That means looking at databases, asking for paperwork on the
book’s previous sales and checking the seller’s reputation in the
community and the industry. But it all begins with a simple,
easily-forgotten question.
“Ask the seller where the item came from,” Magness-Gardiner said. “I personally would not accept ‘I don’t know’ for an answer.”
A Rogue’s Gallery of Book Thieves Anders Burius, the former head of the National Library of
Sweden’s manuscript department, committed suicide (and accidentally blew
up his apartment) in 2004 after authorities realized he was stealing
books from his own workplace. The FBI located and returned some of his bounty last year, but many books remain missing. William Jacques, an oil-company accountant dubbed the “Tome
Raider” by the British press, was jailed for stealing rare books by
Newton, Thomas Paine and others from Cambridge University and other
libraries in the 1990s. When he was released, he promptly stole books
from the Royal Horticultural Society. Many books remain missing, and he
is now banned from all U.K. libraries. Raymond Scott, an eccentric British antiques dealer and con
man, was imprisoned for attempting to sell a stolen, vandalized copy of
Shakespeare’s First Folio in 2008. The First Folio ,
along with other rare books and documents, had been stolen from Durham
University 10 years earlier. Scott showed up for trial in a limousine
and committed suicide in prison in 2012. Gary Evans, a violent jewel thief and serial killer, was also a
self-taught antiques expert. Busted in 1994 for stealing a first
edition of John James Audubon’s The Birds of America from a
Vermont library, he got a reduced sentence in exchange for returning the
book. He continued stealing antiques until police realized he was a
murderer in 1998. Escaping a police van thanks to a handcuff key hidden
deep in his nose, Evans killed himself by leaping off a highway bridge.
An example of Oriental items which has been stolen
Tens of thousands of pounds worth of antiques have been stolen from homes.
The thieves have raided the homes in West Sussex while the occupants
are asleep, always making off with valuable items – on one occasion
stealing a seven-foot grandfather clock.
Among the items taken during the first burglary between 9pm on January
2 and 9am on January 3 were more than a dozen ivory figures, porcelain
and jade perfume bottles and boxes from the Far East, a series of
paintings and a dozen Royal Doulton figurines of ladies.
On this occasion the raider targeted the property in Amberley Drive, Worthing, while the elderly resident was asleep.
The second burglary took place in in Old Fort Road, Shoreham, between
3pm on January 2 and 5am on January 4 while the owner was away.
A large amount of valuable gold jewellery was taken along with oil
paintings, bone handled cutlery, watches, Hornby 00 gauge railway items,
60 collectable American tobacco silks and a pair of foot high blue
Chinese dragons from the Far East.
The third burglary was at a home in Washington, near Steyning, between
1.50am and 2.50am on January 7 while the residents were asleep.
Among the items taken were a number of brass clocks, silver
candlesticks and cutlery, Chinese vases, a satinwood table and a walnut
cupboard.
The fourth burglary was at a home in East Street, West Chiltington,
near Horsham, between 11.45pm on Thursday and 9am on Friday.
The items taken include a seven-foot grandfather clock, a number of paintings, two TVs and a DVD player.
Detective Constable Jon Stadius said: "In each case the burglars
appear to have selected carefully the items they think are of the most
value and left other items behind.
"Large numbers of items have been taken so a vehicle would have been
needed to transport them away. Some of the items, such as the
grandfather clock, were extremely heavy so it is likely a number of
people have been involved.
"We would like to speak to anyone who has seen any people or vehicles
in the areas of the burglaries recently who looked suspicious or out of
place.
"We are also keen to speak to anyone who may have seen the items for sale or has been offered the chance to buy them.
"Please contact us if you know anything at all so we can catch those responsible."
Host of stolen items to be reunited with Brighton owners
Staff at Brighton Police station have amassed dozens of stolen items from burglaries across the area.
Paintings, signs, brass fittings, antiques, ornaments and similar
items were stolen in 30 incidents around Brighton and Hove between March
and October last year.
Police have worked to trace and reunite the items with their owners
and are urging anyone who has lost possessions to get in touch. Some items can be viewed online on the police website here.
A 37-year-old man has been convicted of three burglaries and
sentenced to nine months in prison, and a 50-year-old Brighton man is
currently on bail after being arrested on suspicion of handling stolen
goods
Most of the properties targeted were large, historic apartment blocks
in Brighton and Hove. The items recovered are all unique and
identifiable. Unfortunately some valuables known to have been stolen are
still missing. They include a limited edition, bronze statue "Horse
Saddled With Time" created by the prominent Spanish surrealist artist
Salvador Dali, worth an estimated £24,000."
– Richard Valder-Davis,Detective Constable
Elderly woman's cash and jewellery taken in suspected distraction burglary in Bexhill
Elderly woman's cash and jewellery taken in suspected distraction burglary in Bexhill
An elderly woman had her cash and jewellery stolen in a suspected distraction burglary.
Police are investigating the incident in Jameson Road, Bexhill after
the woman allowed a caller to enter her flat at about 11.30am yesterday.
The caller said he needed to leave a note for a flat upstairs and the woman, 81, stayed with him while he wrote it out.
The saga of an Impressionist
painting stolen from the Baltimore Museum of Art decades ago and
allegedly purchased for $7 at a West Virginia flea market came to an end
Friday in federal court in Alexandria when a judge rendered her
verdict: Renoir Girl is losing her Renoir.
U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema awarded the painting to the
BMA at the expense of the woman who dubbed herself “Renoir Girl,”
ending a bizarre art drama that generated coverage from the Los Angeles
Times to “Good Morning America.” The decision wiped out a potential
six-figure windfall for Loudoun County driving instructor Martha Fuqua,
who claimed that in 2009 she found “On the Shore of the Seine” in a box
containing a plastic cow and a Paul Bunyan doll.
“Darn,” said Fuqua, 51, when she was contacted by phone after the
ruling. Asked if she was disappointed, she said, “Of course,” before
hanging up. She didn’t attend Friday’s hearing, which was filled with
stolen-art rubberneckers and reporters.
Her tale initially burst
into the headlines in September 2012, when Fuqua, then identified only
as Renoir Girl, tried auctioning off the 51
/
2-by-9-inch landscape, which she hoped would
sell for as much as $100,000. In the run-up to the auction, two things
were known about the painting: The piece had been bought at a Paris art
gallery in 1926 by Herbert L. May, the husband of Saidie May, a
prominent BMA donor. And the painting somehow had gone missing since
May’s purchase. Initially, the BMA said it had no record of the painting
ever being in its possession.
But days before the sale at the
Potomack Company in Alexandria, a Washington Post reporter found
evidence in the BMA’s own records that the May family had donated the
painting to the museum in 1937. Armed with those records, BMA officials
made an unexpected discovery:
a loan registration document showing that the painting was reported
stolen from a November 1951 exhibition. Baltimore police unearthed a
copy of the original police report.
The FBI took possession of the Renoir from the auction house,
stored it in a climate-controlled room in its Northern Virginia field
office in Manassas and asked the federal court to determine who should
own it.
Since then, a number of people who know Fuqua have cast
doubt on her flea market story, including her brother. Some family
acquaintances told The Post that they remember
seeing the Renoir in the 1980s and 1990s at the Fairfax County home of
her mother, Marcia Fouquet, who attended art college in Baltimore at the
time of the painting’s theft in 1951. (The mother passed away five
months ago at the age of 85.)
During Friday’s court hearing, the
BMA argued that regardless of whether Fuqua found the Renoir at a flea
market, no one can have legal title to stolen artwork.
Brinkema agreed in her ruling, granting summary judgment
in favor of the BMA. She said the museum had overwhelming evidence that
the painting had been stolen in November 1951 and that Fuqua offered
not a “scintilla” of proof to the contrary.
Brinkema’s decision
cancels a trial that had been scheduled for next week and wipes out what
could have been a useful windfall for Fuqua, who in 2009 filed for
bankruptcy, citing debts of more than $400,000.
Fuqua’s attorney,
T. Wayne Biggs, argued in court that the BMA’s evidence — the police
report and other decades-old museum records — needed proper
authentication to be admissable. But Brinkema said that the BMA
furnished a mountain of evidence that “clearly reflected” that the item
had been pilfered.
Biggs declined to comment after the hearing.
Doreen
Bolger, the BMA’s director, said she was “delighted” by the judge’s
decision. She likened the painting’s return to a “prodigal son who’s
been lost for 60 years” and is finally coming home. “I’m just glad to
have it over and to have the decision be so clear-cut.”
Marla Diaz, the BMA’s attorney, said that Fuqua can appeal the judge’s decision but doubted whether she would. Matt Fuqua,
Martha’s brother, who attended the hearing, was elated by the judge’s
ruling and stood outside the courthouse before a bank of television
cameras, giving interviews.
Before she died, his mother had urged Martha to return to the painting to the BMA, he said. “My mother wanted this.”
He
said he suspects that the painting was given to his mother long ago as a
gift, but she never revealed where it came from. The FBI declined to
comment on its investigation into the circumstances surrounding the
painting’s theft and alleged appearance at a flea market.
Bolger
said the BMA plans to exhibit “On the Shore of the Seine” as soon as
March, as part of an exhibition of works bequeathed by Saidie May. The
museum is debating whether to make available for visitors printouts of
news stories about the Renoir case so they can view the piece and read
its back story at the same time.
Asked if the museum would be
taking special care to ensure that the piece would not be stolen again,
Bolger said that no one need worry. That painting, Bolger stressed, will
not escape the BMA’s hands.
“It’ll be anchored to the wall,” she said.
Onetime aide to Imelda Marcos sentenced to up to six year in prison after plotting to sell $32 million Claude Monet painting
Artwork vanished in 1986 amid President Ferdinand Marcos' overthrow
His wife's disgraced secretary Vilma Bautista sold it to pay for debts
Work is part of lengthy roster of property the Philippines wants back
Former first lady Imelda was infamous for her massive shoe collection
A former aide to the former first lady of the Philippines Imelda Marcos has been jailed for trying to sell a stolen Claude Monet painting worth $32million. Disgraced secretary Vilma Bautista was convicted of illegally selling the 1899 painting
titled Japanese Footbridge Over Water Lily Pond in Giverny from Mrs
Marcos' vast collection. The artwork vanished in 1986 amid President Ferdinand Marcos’ overthrow and ended up in Bautista’s hands.
Vilma Bautista (center) was convicted of
illegally selling the 1899 painting titled Japanese Footbridge Over
Water Lily Pond in Giverny
Former first lady Imelda Marcos didn't testify at Bautista's trial and knew nothing of the sale
It is part of a
multibillion-dollar roster of property the Philippines government claims
the Marcoses acquired with the nation's cash, prosecutors said.
But during the trial, Bautista's defense lawyers claimed she was caught up in a clash between a government and its ousted leader. She was sentenced yesterday to two to six years behind bars.
Bautista
plans to appeal and has 'substantial issues' to raise, defense
attorneys Susan and Fran Hoffinger said after the sentencing. Bautista
also was ordered to pay about $3.5 million in state taxes. She was
convicted in November of charges including conspiracy and tax fraud. The
case 'finally solves the mystery of what happened to four masterpieces
of Impressionist art,' Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr.
said then.
Le Bassin aux Nympheas by Monet, painted in
1899. The former secretary to Imelda Marcos, Vilma Bautista, was
convicted of trying to sell it
The 1899 Monet, from the
French painter's famed 'Water Lilies' series, and other art ended up in
Bautista's hands after vanishing when a 1986 'people power' revolt sent
longtime President Ferdinand Marcos into exile in Hawaii. He died three
years later. During his two decades in power, his wife became known for excess, symbolized by her huge collection of shoes. The
Philippines claims the Marcoses acquired billions of dollars' worth of
property with the nation's money. The country has spent years seizing
companies, bank accounts and other assets believed to be part of that
trove.
Imelda Marcos (left), who was ousted from power
along with her president husband in a 1986 coup, scandalized the world
with her enormous shoe collection
U.S. President Ronald Reagan, who died in June
2004, escorts Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos and his wife Imelda
as they depart the Oval Office at White House in 1982
The Marcoses denied
their wealth was ill-gotten, and Imelda Marcos has emerged relatively
unscathed from hundreds of legal cases against her and her late husband.
She is now a congresswoman in the Philippines. Bautista
was a foreign service officer assigned to the Philippine Mission to the
United Nations and later served as Imelda Marcos' New York-based
personal secretary. By
2009, Bautista was mired in debt, and prosecutors said she resorted to
trying to sell four paintings the Marcoses had acquired during the
presidency. Besides the water lily painting, they included another Monet
and works by Alfred Sisley and Albert Marquet. Bautista
ultimately sold the water lily painting - 'Le Bassin aux Nymphease,'
also known as 'Japanese Footbridge Over the Water-Lily Pond at Giverny' -
for $32 million to a Swiss buyer. Some proceeds went to Bautista's
debts, relatives and associates, and $15 million stayed in her bank
accounts, prosecutors said. They said Imelda Marcos, who didn't testify at Bautista's trial, knew nothing of the sale. Bautista's
lawyers said she believed that Imelda Marcos rightfully owned the
paintings and that Bautista had authority to sell them for her. Bautista
never had a chance to give Marcos the money, the defense said. The artworks' ownership is being determined in civil courts.
A collection of gold pocket watches, stolen last Friday
from the Royal B.C.Museum, were recovered Wednesday by the Victoria
Police Department.
The suspects, a 44-year-old Port Alberni man (formerly of Colwood)
and a 29-year-old Port Alberni woman, were both arrested by Port Alberni
RCMP earlier this week at the request of VicPD.
VicPD used a fingerprint left at the scene to trace the crime back to
the Colwood man, while the eight pocket watches "had gone through a
number of different hands" before officers tracked them down locally,
said Sgt. Colin Brown of VicPD's Crime Reduction Unit.
"In this particular case, it's a crime of opportunity," Brown said at
a press conference Thursday. "But there was definitely some thought
that went into it. It's not like the museum didn't have good security in
place, they did, but you can tell, even though (the suspects) are not
the most sophisticated people, they've certainly been involved in thefts
in the past."
Brown said the pocket watches were likely traded for drugs or cash
before the couple left Victoria for Port Alberni, and said police worked
quickly to recover them through local sources.
RBCM CEO Jack Lohman called the incident a "very rare occurrence,"
and praised VicPD for tracking down the valuable artifacts so quickly.
"I've worked with museums all around the world … where there hasn't been this great speed of work (by police)," Lohman said.
Bill Chimko, RBCM's head of security, said the watches were stolen
from a secured glass case in the Old Town exhibit on the museum's third
floor during operating hours, but refused to go into further detail. He
said security measures are being adjusted as a result of the theft.
The RBCM maintains a collection of 106 pocket watches amongst its
seven-million objects, Lohman said. He couldn't speculate on the value
of the items.
Brian Gerald Holt and Stacy Croft are each facing a charge of theft over $5,000. The recovered items are listed as follows:
Gold pocket watch. RBCM 2002.51.1: "Repeater"
model, very unusual among watches. It chimed the quarter hour for HBC
Captain James Gaudin, c. 1870. Jeweled. Quarter hour repeater sounds
by pushing down - away from stem - on small tab on right hand side of
watch). Owned by Captain James Gaudin, Captain of HBC sailing barque Lady Lampson,
which travelled between London and Victoria in the 1870's. Rear of case
frame inscribed “Captain James Gaudin/St Martins/Jersey”
Railroad watch in a Hunter case., c. 1890. RBCM 977.29.12a, 12b
Waltham watch belonging to Bill Miner, BC’s last train robber.
RBCM 963.27.1: Pocket watch belonging to Bill Miner.
Movement made 1901, prior to Bill Miner's train robberies of 1904. May
have been left behind when he escaped from BC Pen, in New Westminster,
in 1907.
Pocket watch with gold vest chain. Waltham, 1891. RBCM 976.56.1
Cashier’s pocket watch. American Watch, 1911. RBCM 971.38.1a & 1b
Gold watch with diamonds. Waltham, 1900. RBCM 999.78.17: Small
gold pocket watch owned by John Williams Spencer, of the David Spencer
department store chain. The front cover is engraved with the initials
WS.
Paintings worth $200,000 stolen from Tiny Township home
Two paintings valued at $200,000 stolen from home in Tiny Township. (OPP Handout)
Police are investigating after two painting were taken from a home in Tiny Township.
The Southern Georgian Bay detachment of the OPP were called to the home on the 15th concession just before 8 p.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 18th, 2013 after receiving a call from an alarm monitoring company.
When officers arrived they found that two paintings were stolen from
the home sometime between Monday Dec. 16, 2013 and Wednesday Dec. 18,
2013.
The paintings, which measure 8’ and 3’, were painted by artist “Morrisseau” and are valued at $200,000.
Brazen thieves steal £40,000 of antique jewellery
One of the antique rings stolen from Shapes Furniture and Auction house on Saturday.
ANTIQUE jewellery worth £40,000 has been stolen after a break-in at a store in Edinburgh.
Shapes Interior Design and Furniture store on Bankhead Medway was broken into in the early hours of Saturday morning.
Thieves made off with a haul of valuables including several distinctive gold and diamond rings.
Police are now appealing for witnesses following the high value break-in, described as a “brazen” crime.
Detective
Constable Joyce Gunderson from Police Scotland said: “This was a brazen
crime which has led to the theft of antique jewellery worth thousands
of pounds, being stolen.
“We are appealing to anyone who was in
the area around the time of the incident, who noticed anything
suspicious, to contact police as a matter of urgency.
“Similarly
anyone who believes they have been offered the stolen items for sale, or
has any other information that can assist our inquiries, should also
get in touch.”
Father and daughter of works of art thieves: steal
a 'Guido Reni'
Amounted to € 100 thousand the value of the stolen goods taken away from
a building in the historic center New Year's Eve and moved into an apartment on
Via Collegio di Spagna
Art for around 100 thousand Euros in value, stolen New Year's Eve and hidden in an apartment, a short walk from the house from which they
had been stolen. It's the 'booty', recovered yesterday and in record time, from
the core protection of the cultural heritage of the Carabinieri
Bologna, who also arrested a father and a daughter, 47 and 27 years for
receiving stolen goods.
The two Calabrian transplanted in the city ', in New Year's Eve had entered a house in the center and stole a painting by Guido Reni, eleven other
ancient paintings of the Bolognese school of the sixteenth century, two ancient
vases in ceramic and glass, three watches antique table including a Parisian
bronze three watches of high quality and 24 items of miscellaneous varies.
The value of stolen property recovered is around 100 thousand Euros.
To make known are the Police, who yesterday raided an apartment,
arrested the 'little family' that now will be 'processed for summary and
recovered the stolen goods, which will be back' in the hands of its rightful
owners.
The police arrived at the two thanks to the
antique dealer who had been contacted for the assignment. Man and
'suspicious, and in recent days has notified the military, which yesterday raided a building in Via Collegio di Spagna where the three
had gathered to view the works. The theft and 'was committed on the night of
December 31 in the Piazza San Giovanni in Monte. The thieves
climbed on scaffolding and had forced a window.
In a flat in the Romanian city of Sibiu are 22 paintings found with an
estimated value of 400 million euros. The paintings were stolen from chapels in
Italy ten years ago.
The value of the collection of works from the Renaissance is estimated
by the police at least 400 million euros. But experts say the oil paintings are
worth much more even. The oldest works are from the 15th century.
The Romanian police entered the collection by accident on the track
after a search of the apartment, because the resident was suspected of theft of
icons from Romanian churches. The agents found in the house many paintings and
made it international reporting. Then the Italian police came into action, who
traveled to Romania.
Historic stolen silver chalice and patens recovered
St Anne's Cathedral in Belfast
A historic silver chalice and patens stolen
from the library at St Anne’s Cathedral in Belfast on October 10 have
been recovered.
The Dean of Belfast, the Very Rev John Mann, yesterday
said: “Needless to say that I am delighted and relieved to hear that the
stolen cathedral silver plate has been found, and that St Anne’s will
have it back soon.
“These communion vessels are important to us,
not for their monetary worth, which is comparatively small, but for
their historic and sacramental connection with the cathedral worshipping
community, and to the old St Anne’s church which stood on the site
before the cathedral was built.”
A PSNI spokesman said: “Following
a report from a member of the public, the silver chalice and patens
reported stolen from St Anne’s Cathedral have been recovered by police,
identified by staff from the cathedral and in due course will be
returned to the cathedral.”
The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra said Wednesday that concertmaster Frank Almond is unharmed following the armed robbery of a borrowed Stradivarius violin estimated to be worth millions of dollars.
