Art crime

Crime news

Suspected Old Master forger Giuliano Ruffini—wanted by French police—cannot be found

The French dealer, who is under investigation for selling a series of allegedly forged paintings, has had a warrant out for his arrest since 2019

Alleged Native American scalp seized from auction house specialised in Confederate and Nazi memorabilia

Authorities received an anonymous tip regarding an object listed for sale on the auction house’s website and described as a Mescalero Apache scalp

Manhattan district attorney returns 187 artefacts tied to disgraced dealer Subhash Kapoor to Pakistan

The objects associated with Kapoor, along with another five pieces returned to Pakistan, were cumulatively valued at $3.4m

Stolen statue linked to antiquities trafficker Doris Wiener repatriated to Cambodia

The sandstone vishnu statue was stolen from a seventh-century temple and smuggled to Manhattan in 1995, when it was sold to a private collector

Disgraced antiquities dealer Subhash Kapoor sentenced to ten years in prison by Indian court

The ruling culminates an extensive investigation into a smuggling ring headed by Kapoor

Art marketcomment

Charm, pedigree, contacts: how to dupe the art market

Court documents from the ongoing Inigo Philbrick fraud saga reveal that the secretive art market and the sheer attractiveness of its lifestyle will always suck the punters in

NFTnews

Mexican government investigating collector who claims he burned a Frida Kahlo drawing for an NFT charity project

Collector Martin Mobarak purportedly set a 1944 Kahlo drawing on fire in a martini glass while a mariachi band burst into song during a ceremony at his Miami mansion

British art dealer Robert Newland pleads guilty to conspiring with Inigo Philbrick to defraud collectors and financiers

Newland was arrested in the UK in February and extradited to the United States in September, where he admitted his role in the $86m scheme for which Inigo Philbrick was sentenced to seven years in prison

A 2,000-year-old Israeli coin minted during the ‘great Jewish revolt’ repatriated by US authorities

The coin, a Quarter Shekel valued at $1m, was looted in from Israel in 2002 and had been headed for auction before being recovered by US Homeland Security agents in 2017

Wanted in the US, Lebanese antiquities collector maintains his innocence, says his ‘big mistake’ was trusting New York art crime official

Lotfi addresses allegations that led to a warrant being issued for his arrest in a statement and interview, giving new details on the extraordinary story of the Metropolitan Museum's gold sarcophagus

French art dealer Didier Wormser stands trial for trafficking looted Egyptian antiquities

Owner of L’Etoile d’Ishtar gallery said artefacts from Saqqara necropolis “should be restituted to Egypt” but insists he purchased them in good faith

US customs agents seize Ancient Egyptian lid for mummy liver

The artefact, seized in Memphis, Tennessee, was en route to a collector who is believed to have falsified statements regarding its value

Exclusive: German museums latest to be implicated in far-reaching criminal investigation into antiquities trafficking

Case has so far seen Middle Eastern works seized from New York's Met and the indictment of a former Louvre director

Winston Churchill portrait stolen from Canadian hotel and replaced with copy

Staff at the Chateau Laurier in Ottawa noticed that the frame of the 1941 photograph did not match others in its reading room

Australian art dealer goes on the run after allegedly ripping off emerging artists

The art dealer Tristian Koenig is accused of selling works by emerging artists and making off with the profits

Police find haul of stolen paintings, including masterworks by Tarsila do Amaral, under a bed in Rio de Janeiro

The works, including pieces by Do Amaral, Di Cavalcanti and others, were seized from the home of a man involved a bizarre scheme to swindle the widow of a famed dealer

Arrest warrant issued for dealer who sold ‘hundreds’ of looted Middle East antiquities—some of which ended up in the Met

Georges Lotfi has been accused of handling the types of materials he helped the police recover and repatriate for years

Italian police stop sale of 'exceptional' Artemisia Gentileschi painting that may have been illegally shipped to Vienna

If judges rule that the owners of the work broke the law, the painting will be definitively confiscated by the state and could be donated to a museum

NFTnews

NFT twist is latest development in saga of contested ‘Leonardo’ painting hidden in a Swiss vault

A painting of a princess possibly by the Old Master has been sold digitally—but questions remain over its provenance, the inherent value of non-fungible tokens and who owns what

Art crimeanalysis

Jailing of British visitor to Iraq could jeopardise tourism and soft diplomacy

After years of conflict and sanctions, heritage trips have been taking off in the area. But potential visitors may be wary after geologist Jim Fitton was given a 15-year sentence for taking “a few worthless pieces of broken pottery”

Crime news

Eight men found guilty of Banksy theft at Bataclan in Paris

Seven individuals given jail terms for stealing “sad girl” tribute work

Crime news

British art dealer faces trial in the US for alleged part in Inigo Philbrick’s ‘ponzi-like scheme’

Robert Newland worked for Philbrick’s secondary market business Modern Collections before stints at Hauser & Wirth and Superblue

UK’s revenue and customs agency begins handing out fines to art market players

HMRC is penalising art world "participants" that have failed to register under the new anti-money laundering legislations

Antiquities trafficking case escalates as Louvre Abu Dhabi joins civil action and Swiss collector files criminal complaint

In wake of scandal involving former Louvre director, France's culture minister forms taskforce to assess acquisitions procedures at museums

Art theftfeature

The shocking story of a Picasso painting that was brazenly stolen and held at ransom by the 'Australian Cultural Terrorists'

Weeping Woman is one of the star works in the new exhibition Picasso Century at Melbourne's National Gallery of Victoria

Eight men accused of stealing a Banksy from the Bataclan concert hall in Paris go on trial

The crooks removed the mural that was painted on an emergency exit door of the Parisian concert hall, though there is disagreement over who ordered the theft

Egyptian antiquities connected to international trafficking ring seized from Metropolitan Museum in New York

Five objects worth more than €3m have been confiscated by authorities as part of a wide-ranging global investigation involving former Louvre director Jean-Luc Martinez

Co-organiser of Anna Sorokin exhibition claims she is owed thousands of dollars for putting on show

A California-based artist says she put expenses totaling $8,000 on her credit card to help stage Sorokin’s solo show in March