Crime News: Update on "near-perfect" art theft
Chester
doctor who nearly pulled off a grand art fraud. To refresh some
memories, the doctor allegedly offered his Monets and Picassos to the
Los Angeles County Art Museum as part of an exhibition. The Museum
gladly agreed. The museum needed to have their own insurance on the
paintings, and the doctor told them the paintings were worth around $12
million total, when in fact they were worth about $3 million total.
The museum didn't bother to question their benefactor and insured the
paintings for the $12 million. When the exhibition was over the doctor
went to an insurance company and produced the Los Angeles County Museum
of Art documents indicating the paintings were worth $12 million. The
salespeople at the insurance agency were eager to write a $12 million
policy and had no troubled being convinced. A while later, the
paintings were stolen from the doctor's house. He asked the insurance
company to pony up. The insurance detectives were a little more
skeptical than the salesmen, though, and they suspected the doctor was
behind the theft. They were unable to prove it, the doctor sued and
the insurance company backed down to the tune of $17.5 million. The
doctor had essentially made a $14 million profit.
So far the doctor's plan was going perfectly. But then two people in
Cleveland got into a marital dispute. The woman tattled on the man:
It seems he had some famous paintings in a storage locker. Officials
opened the locker and found the missing Monets and Picassos. Somehow
the two people in Cleveland were involved with the theft. The doctor
and his lawyer were arrested on charges of conspiracy, wire fraud and
money laundering. The lawyer confessed, the doctor was convicted
Tuesday.
DOCTOR CONVICTED OF FAKING ART THEFT
Tried to Collect $17.5M in Insurance
July 21, 1999
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- A former eye surgeon was convicted Tuesday of
faking the theft of Monet and Picasso paintings from his home and
collecting $17.5 million in insurance.
Dr. Steven G. Cooperman was convicted on 18 federal counts, including
conspiracy, wire fraud and money laundering. He faces a maximum of life
in prison at sentencing.
Cooperman, 56, who now lives in Fairfield, Conn., reported the
paintings missing from his Brentwood home in July 1992 after returning
from a vacation.
Monet, Picasso reported stolen
Claude Monet's "The Customs Officer's Cabin at Pourville," from 1882,
was insured for $5 million, and Pablo Picasso's "Nude Before a Mirror,"
painted in 1932, was insured for $7.5 million.
Shortly after the theft, he sued the companies for stalling payment and
eventually won a $17.5 million settlement.
In 1997 the paintings were discovered in a Cleveland storage facility,
and Cooperman's former attorney testified during the trial that he and
the doctor conspired to steal the paintings.
--
- Chester
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