[MSN] Federal investigators have concluded that thieves armed with detailed shipping information were behind the removal of a Goya painting from a truck en route to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum from Ohio last week, law enforcement officials said Friday.

[Museum Security Network Mailinglist]

November 18, 2006
Goya Theft Is Attributed to Inside Knowledge 
By DAVID JOHNSTON
WASHINGTON, Nov. 17 - Federal investigators have concluded that thieves
armed with detailed shipping information were behind the removal of a Goya
painting from a truck en route to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum from Ohio
last week, law enforcement officials said Friday.

The 1778 painting, "Children With a Cart," was packed inside several nested
crates aboard a locked unmarked truck used by a professional art
transporter. The crated painting was removed from an outer shipping
container in the truck while it was parked at a Howard Johnson Inn near
Bartonsville, Pa.

The two drivers checked into the hotel around 11 p.m. on Nov. 7, according
to the motel manager, Faizal Bhimani. He said the white midsize truck was
left in an unlighted parking lot adjacent to the hotel, out of sight of the
hotel's rooms and the main office. 

When the drivers returned to the truck at about 6:30 a.m. on Nov. 8, the
locks had been broken and the painting, insured for $1 million, was gone,
law enforcement officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Mr.
Bhimani said the hotel's night clerk had neither seen nor heard anything
suspicious.

Mr. Bhimani said in a telephone interview that investigators had reviewed
videotapes taken at the motel's front desk. But he said the tapes had given
no indication that other people might have been monitoring the drivers'
movements when they arrived.

Investigators have conducted extensive interviews with the drivers, asking,
among other questions, why they left the truck unattended when operating
procedures for most art transport companies require that trucks carrying
valuable art objects never be left unattended.

Investigators have also asked the drivers why they stopped overnight on a
trip that could have been completed in a single day. Officials said the
drivers replied that they were scheduled to arrive in Manhattan around
midday on Nov. 8 and did not want to arrive too early and wait in New York
until the assigned time.

The hotel is off Interstate 80, a few miles west of Stroudsburg, Pa. The
motel was identified as the place where the theft occurred on Thursday in
The Times Leader of Wilkes-Barre. 

The likelihood that the thief or thieves knew that a valuable painting was
on the truck and were aware of its location led the authorities to conclude
that whoever stole the painting had obtained precise information about the
contents and route of the truck, even though such details are closely held
at the two museums involved - the Toledo Museum of Art and the Guggenheim -
and among employees at the art shipper. Law enforcement authorities did not
identify the shipper.

While the authorities said they assumed that the painting had been taken by
someone who hoped to profit, they added that selling a recognizable work by
such a well-known artist would be difficult. Even a private collector,
buying through the black market, could probably never take the risk of
showing the painting in any visible setting. 

The F.B.I office in Philadelphia, which is in charge of the investigation,
has released few details about the case, hoping to use information about the
theft to evaluate any tips. But few leads have been forthcoming, the
officials said, and there have been no breakthroughs.

No one has been arrested and no suspects have emerged, said the officials,
who requested anonymity because of the continuing investigation. Officials
at the Toledo Museum of Art, which owns the Goya painting, referred
questions about the case to the F.B.I.

Officials at the Guggenheim, who were planning to include the painting in
"Spanish Painting From El Greco to Picasso: Time, Truth and History," a
sweeping exhibition that opened on Friday, also referred questions to the
F.B.I.

The bureau's Philadelphia office operates one of its best-known art theft
units. Jerri Williams, an agent and spokeswoman for the office, said, "It
appears that the person or persons knew what they were doing." 

The insurer, who has not been identified, has offered a $50,000 reward for
information about the theft. Representatives of other insurers said the
theft of fine art is a perennial problem. If carried out by insiders, they
said, the crime would underscore the lack of industrywide security standards
among fine art shippers, handlers and brokers, which include a few large
companies and many smaller niche firms.

"A big concern for us is the lack of uniform standards," said Christiane
Fischer, president and chief executive officer of the AXA Art Insurance
Corporation in New York, which she said had not insured the Goya painting.
"In an industry that handles billions of dollars of fine art, we feel we are
very vulnerable," she said. She cited the absence of minimum standards for
employee background checks and other security procedures.

However, Ms. Fischer said insurers were usually optimistic that they would
recover rare paintings. "The good news for us as an insurance company is
that our chance of recovery is much higher for this kind of work," she said.
"There is just no way that piece can enter the fine art market."

Thomas J. Carney, president of Midwest Fine Arts Service and Transportation,
a company based in Berea, Ohio, that did not ship the Goya, said reputable
shippers normally exercise great care in handling and shipping fine art and
antiquities.

He said trucks with multiple locks are monitored by satellite, which records
the location of the vehicle, whether the engine is on or off, and even how
fast the engine is running. However, individual artworks are not usually
tagged with tracking devices, he said.

Drivers are often subjected to background checks, Mr. Carney said, and
information about shipments is limited to a few people in each company.
Shipments are usually accompanied by two drivers, and sometimes by a third
person, a courier, who rides along to make sure the cargo is safe. Shipping
documents are kept intentionally vague to avoid disclosing the precise
nature of the cargo.

"Usually only two or three people at a museum know what it is being
shipped," Mr. Carney said. "A shipping broker would know. A dispatcher would
only know there is an order, but we wouldn't even say who the artist is."

http://www.nytimes.com/