Art
security
Overseas tip led
FBI to recover stolen art worth up to $24 million
LOS ANGELES Fri Dec 19, 2014
10:16pm GMT
1 OF 2. Recovered paintings are pictured during a news
conference at FBI Headquarters in Los Angeles, California December 19, 2014.
CREDIT: REUTERS/MARIO ANZUONI
(Reuters) - An overseas tip investigators
received six years after one of the biggest art heists in Los Angeles led to
the return of nine stolen paintings, including works by Marc Chagall and Diego
Rivera, collectively worth as much as $24 million, police and FBI said on
Friday.
The paintings were
recovered in an FBI sting operation in which a suspect, Raul Espinoza, 45, was
arrested after he tried to sell the stolen artwork to undercover agents at a
Los Angeles-area hotel in October for $700,000, authorities said.
Espinoza was charged with
receiving stolen property and more suspects are being sought, investigators
said at a news conference where they disclosed new details of the case and
displayed the artwork. Espinoza has pleaded not guilty and is still in custody.
The nine paintings were
part of the private collection of an elderly Los Angeles couple who have since
died. They were home when the paintings were snatched in August 2008 but were
bedridden and unaware of the theft at the time, police said.
Los Angeles Police
Detective Donald Hrycyk said the daytime burglary occurred during a short but
unspecified "window of opportunity" when the couple, who were under
round-the-clock care, were presumably left unattended. The Los Angeles Times
has reported the theft occurred while a housekeeper was out shopping for
groceries.
Hrycyk said three
additional art works believed to have been stolen from the home were still
missing.
A $200,000 reward was
offered months after the heist, but the case grew cold until September 2014,
when investigators received an overseas tip that led them to Espinoza and
arrangement of the sting operation, the FBI and police said.
The Times reported the
tip pointed police to a man in Europe known as "Darko" who was
soliciting buyers for the stolen art.
The FBI has since posted
a $25,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of others
involved.
Among the pieces recovered
were the Chagall painting "Les Paysans" and Rivera's "Mexican
Peasant." Except for the Chagall, dated from about 1976, all the works
date from the first half of the 20th century.
The nine paintings were
collectively appraised at $13.6 million to $24 million and rank as the most
valuable art collection stolen in Los Angeles "in recent history,"
comparable to the theft of a dozen Andy Warhol works from a private home in
September 2009, Hrycyk said. Those portraits have yet to be recovered, he said.
(This story corrects to
fix first name of defendant to Raul, not Paul, in paragraph 2)
(Reporting by Steve
Gorman; Editing by Dan Grebler)
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