81: Wanna Make 10 Million Dollars? Find This Painting: Craziest Art Heists in History | Dark History with Bailey Sarian
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This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner and more.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow. Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory. ♪

Hi friends, I hope you're having a wonderful day today. My name is Bailey Sarian and I'd like to welcome you to my study and to my podcast, Dark History. This is a chance to tell the story like it is and to share the history of stuff we would never think about. Oh yeah, I'm a curious one. I like to find out as much as I can. I love learning. So all you need to do is sit back, relax, and just let me talk about that hot, juicy history goss. Look,

I love buying art for my home or office.

or even my Sims. I even studied art history in college. And when I first moved into my new place, I wanted, or I had, a million paintings I wanted to hang up. Eventually I went with a murder scene. Specifically a painting by Caravaggio. It's a very calming piece for me, I just don't know what to tell ya. It's called Judith Beheading Holofernes. Judith is knifing this guy's neck and blood is spraying everywhere. Yeah.

Yeah, and it's hanging up on my wall. But I love this painting because it's really about women empowerment. Really, if you think about it, I could talk about it all day. What I'm getting at is good art can really make you feel things, right? I mean, the most famous painting in the world, the Mona Lisa, makes people feel like she's judging them.

I mean, is it even a she? Many speculate it's a he. We don't know. I don't know. And speaking of Little Miss Side Eye, did you know that the Mona Lisa is valued at around $1 billion today? Now that kind of money, it draws in a whole different kind of crowd and not the kind that likes going to museums. I'm talking about art thieves. Oh yes, friends. Oh yes. We even have one here live in studio. What's it like to be an art thief, Joan? Okay, cool.

So ever since there's been art and people willing to fork out big bucks for it, there have also been people trying to snatch it. And I mean, if you pay attention to television and movies, stealing art always kind of looks the same. There's always like a gun, explosions, someone in a cat suit,

kind of falling from the ceiling, a briefcase full of money, you know? But the best thieves, they don't have to lower themselves through skylights or limbo under laser beams to get their hands on the goods, especially in the days before technology.

Back in 1911, you could just like walk into the museum, snatch a painting off the wall and still make it home in time to churn your butter. And fun fact, that's exactly what someone did. Stealing, not churning. A guy named Vincenzo Perugia straight up walked into the Louvre. The Louvre is a major museum in Paris. So they just walk straight in there.

took the Mona Lisa right out of her frame, rolled her right up, tucked her under his arm, and just walked straight out. No one even noticed that the painting with the mysterious smile was MIA until an art student was setting up his easel in that same very room. Now he was getting ready to do some sketching and he was like, hey,

Isn't the Mona Lisa supposed to be right there? Like what's that about? Where's, you know, no one even knew. Two whole years went by without anyone knowing what happened to the painting or where the heck she went. It was like, where in the world is Carmen Sandiego but with the Mona Lisa instead?

Dozens of people were called in for questioning by the police, including Pablo Picasso, who was apparently friends with another art collector who had a reputation for stealing. But then Vincenzo makes a rookie mistake.

He reaches out to a famous art dealer in Italy, where he's living at this point, where he tries to sell the stolen art. And well, the art dealer is no dummy. He knows there's only been one Mona Lisa and it was also just recently stolen. He's like, oh yeah. So he goes straight to the police. And next thing you know, they're knocking on Vincenzo's door, you know, and he is snacked.

Shh, don't get arrested. Vincenzo, next time you steal a famous piece of art, sell it on the black market like everyone else does. Well, I guess someone had to learn somewhere. So the Mona Lisa is finally recovered two years later and goes right back into the Louvre, but this time with some extra security. I mean, many people have speculated. What in the hell was Vincenzo even doing with that piece of art for the two years? Did he have it just hanging up on his wall in the bathroom?

Was he just, I don't know, looking at it? What was he doing? I mean, Vincenzo was a painter, so maybe he really did just admire the piece and wanted it for himself. But most likely he was trying to cash in and it was just waiting for the buzz to die down. But I mean, it's the, it's the Mona Lisa, you know, they weren't just gonna like forget about it. Either way, Vincenzo pulled off an impressive heist. I mean, he walked in and walked out. It was mind blowing. If you go to the Louvre now and see the Mona Lisa,

You will see, first of all, it's like this big. It's not even that big. And there's like a ton of people standing in front of it trying to like hold hands with her. It's wild. And you're like, it's not even that great. I don't get it. There's so much other pretty art in there. Anyway, it's not the point. What's crazy to me is that the best thieves operate just like this in plain sight.

In fact, the most successful art thief in the world only ever carried a Swiss army knife and pulled off every single museum robbery during business hours. This guy's name was Stefan Breitweiser. Now some people steal for money. I mean, some may even steal for clout.

Some people steal because they're even addicted to stealing, you know? A lot of middle schoolers, eighth greeners, going to Claire's, you know, sticky fingers, those people. But Stefan, he stole for love.

Stephane was born in 1971 in Northeast France and his parents were pretty well off and his childhood home was filled with like really beautiful things, very valuable antiques, furniture from the 1700s. He had a lot of fine art.

His growing up was very bougie. His mom and dad wanted young Stefan to become a lawyer, but it wasn't in the cards for him. And he ended up dropping out of school just after a few years. Stefan was like really into art history and loved going to museums. He kind of reminds me of a French William Randolph Hearst, who we did a story on. Super close with his mom, big into architecture, but then something happens that forever changes his life.

and throws him off the track of becoming a Hearst star. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner and more.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow. Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere. And the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory. Way to hire.

When he's 22 years old, Stefan's parents, their marriage ends, I guess like really badly, okay? His dad leaves and takes all of the bougie items in the house.

I mean the furniture, the art, and even all the money with him. And Stefan's mom was a nurse and without Stefan's dad around to support them, all those antiques were replaced with IKEA furniture. Like actual IKEA furniture. Not to say it's bad, but you know, you get what I'm saying. I'm painting the picture, you get it. And the luxury Stefan had gotten used to his whole life were like suddenly out of his reach. So this hits Stefan hard.

But love is there to save the day because this is when he meets the love of his life, Anne Catherine Klangloss. Now they're the same age and they both have a love for art and antiques. And after just a few months, he asked her to move in with him and his mom. That's so hot. Stefan and Anne love each other.

loved going to museums together. So cute. And then one day they're in like a little museum in a French village nearby and Stefan just stops dead in his tracks, okay? He sees an antique pistol on display that he was just like, oh, what? Mind blown. Like he just...

Love this shit. His dad used to collect old weapons, so most likely it reminded him of his dhati and the finer things they used to have before he left the family with diddly squat. So to Stefan, he almost feels like the pistol was owed to him. And then Anne says something that seals the deal. She leans over to him and whispers, go ahead.

"Take it." There was no security guard, no alarm system, just a volunteer at the entrance of the museum. So he's like, "You know what? I'm gonna take it." So he does, he takes it. He hides it in his pants and just walks right out with it. Wow. Who knew stealing art was so easy? And apparently Anne being supportive of Stefan's sticky fingers made him believe that they were, quote, "Destined to be together." They were giving very Pinky and the Brain energy.

Were you pinky or were you the brain? Let me know down below. I was kind of a pinky, but now I'm a brain. Stefan got a little excited. Okay, he got away with stealing this beautiful antique pistol.

And now he's kind of wanting more, right? And the more he steals, the better he gets at it. He starts testing the limits of museum security camera quality. He learns the schedules of security guards. He memorizes all the exits and figures out a routine. So like for him, when he goes to a museum, he always had these rules. Always be friendly at the front desk, say hello,

Dress nicely. Make sure you wear a jacket that's just a little oversized. A little, not too much. So you can hide some stuff in it. And carry a Swiss army knife in the pocket to unscrew any casing or cut open a display case. And he would do all of this during museum hours. I mean, this guy was ballsy.

Pretty soon, Anne and Stefan, they're working together. She works as his lookout and coughs if anyone gets close while Stefan is stealing. This starts to become a ritual. They go to museums and if something moves him, he makes a plan to make it his, to steal it. And I mean, he gets obsessive.

If he's emotionally affected by a piece of art, he literally won't sleep until it's his. And according to Stefan, this is what sets him apart from other thieves. He vows to himself only to steal items he loves and to never sell them. It's so funny. He's like, I'm above all the other thieves. I'm a different thief.

I do it for love. Stefan has said that stealing art for money is stupid. Money can be made with far less risk, but stealing for love is ecstatic. By the early 1990s, Stefan in his mid twenties has stolen over 100 objects. And you'd think he'd have them on display throughout his home since he's a big art lover, right? But no, Stefan was putting them in the attic bedroom of his mother's house where he lived with

with Anne and his mom.

Stefan calls it his Ali Baba's cave, aka his cave of wonders, because it's so crowded. There are goblets and snuff boxes and statues on every surface, and the walls are like completely covered with paintings. One of them dates back to the 16th century and is worth more than all of the houses on his mother's street times two, just sitting in his attic. But his mother, meanwhile, has had no idea what her son and his girlfriend were up to.

I mean, all she knew is that her son worked as a waiter and was a nurse's assistant. And sometimes they would like go away to antique fairs. It was cute. They were a cute couple. I love them. Plus it helps that Stefan apparently always kept the attic door locked.

But one day, Stefan gets a little cocky. He and Anne are in Switzerland, and it's too hot for Stefan to wear like a big jacket that he usually uses to stash art in. So this man, instead, he takes a painting off the wall and walks out with it tucked under his arm. Like it's a little clutch at a wedding. Ah!

Ballsy! Anyway, for some reason, this doesn't fly with security and he gets caught, fingerprinted, and then he and Anne spend the night in jail. They convince the police that they aren't thieves, that they've never done anything like this before. Please, sir. And the cops end up letting them go. So Anne makes Stefan promise that he will never steal from Switzerland again. I mean, you know, he has a record there now.

And then she asks that he start wearing surgical gloves when he steals, that way his fingerprints won't be recognized. Good idea, Anne. But a couple of years later, Stefan's in Switzerland again, and he just can't help himself. A fancy little antique bugle catches his eye and he steals it. Anne is pissed when she finds out. I mean, they had agreed, no more stealing from Switzerland.

Hello? I mean, the two were already going through a bit of a rough patch and this just did not help. And on top of the ceiling, she finds out he wasn't even wearing the gloves like he had promised. Weird. A man did not listen. She decides to go back and clean the fingerprints off herself. I mean, since it would be a bad idea for Stefan to be seen going back there. So they head back.

Stefan's driving and Stefan decides to go on a little walk while Anne goes into the museum for the fingerprints. And his loitering is immediately clocked by a journalist who read about the bugle theft the day before. The journalist tells the front desk of the museum and the museum front desk recognizes Stefan's notorious jacket from the day of the robbery. So it's just all around bad luck, wrong place, wrong time, but not really 'cause they're catching a bad guy.

Whatever. So Anne hears like all this commotion happening. She hears that the front desk is calling the police and she tries to run outside to warn Stefan. But it's too late. He's already cuffed and taken into custody where he denies everything. After all, I mean, he's in a foreign country. No one knows who he is or like what he does. But eventually the police find the report from the last time he got caught.

and they aren't falling for the, "My bad, this was like a one-time thing" story. The real kicker is that during questioning, Stefan learns that they never even considered dusting the museum for fingerprints. So the whole trip back to Switzerland was really pointless.

Whoopsies. While Stefan is sweating in his Swiss jail cell and he's just praying, you know, no one has figured out that they need to search his mom's house because by now he's got about again 300 stolen pieces in there. He's like, I just hope they don't go to my mom's house. So of course the police eventually they end up going to his mom's house. It takes a couple of weeks to get the search warrant but by the time the police make their way up to the attic

It's freaking empty. There's not a single piece of art in sight. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner and more.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

This is an ad by BetterHelp. What?

What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better, even when it's impossible to make time for them. Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow.

Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash DarkHistory today to get 10% off your first month.

That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash dark history. At this point, Stefan's been in jail for weeks and he's close to breaking. He's only admitted to stealing the bugle, but he wants to go home. So when an officer comes in with a picture of a little gold medal and he tells Stefan that if he admits to taking it, he can leave.

You can go, you can be free. So Stefan, he confesses, but obviously it was a trap, okay? The officer pulls a whole album of pictures and essentially says like, if you also stole that piece, then you must have stolen all of this.

All the pictures the officers showed him were stolen things they had found in a bag in a river. I guess like this is where Anne had dumped them. Like, yeah, she didn't even think to find a storage unit or anything. She just dumped them. I mean, Stefan really shot himself in the foot. He even asked the officer like, wait a minute, wait, I

"What about all the paintings I stole?" And the officers were like, "What?" And he was like, "What? Nothing." So apparently, Stefan's mom was just as paranoid as Anne because guess what she did? She set all of his paintings, I'm using quotes here around his, can you see it? You can. She set all of his paintings, over 66 of them, on fire in the woods.

So imagine you're a painting for a minute, like you've survived 300 years of just being a painting. And finally your time comes, you're hanging in a museum and then some 27 year old jackass steals you, hangs you in his attic and then

His mom sets you on fire. Like that's, that sucks. Surprisingly, Anne and Stefan's relationship also went up in flames. They ended up breaking up. And even after they'd broken up, Stefan backed up Anne's story in court and said she had nothing to do with his thievery, which is so romantic. At the end of the day, Stefan spends four years in jail, which is honestly a pretty good deal for having robbed almost 200 different places.

Not bad. Stéphane never carried a gun or injured anyone in his heist. And because in Europe, the cost of the art doesn't affect the prison sentence, therefore, he's not gonna get a really long prison sentence, is he? For the legal system, there's essentially no difference between mass produced posters and Renaissance masterpieces. So that's why his sentencing was so low.

Stefan's mom, she ends up spending a few months in jail for her part in the destruction of the art and ends up spending one single night in jail. By the time Stefan is free, I mean, she's already with another guy, moved on, pregnant, you know? Good for her. So maybe the lesson here is never steal just because someone you like tells you to.

I don't know. To this day, Stefan holds the record for number of pieces stolen and number of places stolen from. Yeah, he's a big deal in the art thievery heist world in his own special way.

In just one year, he was responsible for half of all the paintings stolen in France. And during his six years in action, he averaged one theft every two weeks. That's impressive. He's got good work ethic. According to the director of London's Art Loss Register, more than 99% of art thieves are motivated by profit rather than beauty, which honestly makes a lot of sense probably to most of us.

Which is why most people also get caught. Because they're trying to sell the piece almost as soon as they've snatched it. But I guess not Stefan. He was that special 1%. Stealing for the love of the art. Now this next art heist, it's the biggest art heist to ever go down in history. And this one is a head scratcher because the motivation behind it

We don't know what it is. Nobody knows. And it almost seems like they did it just to do it. It's wild. Now this is an art heist that has frustrated law officials, confused art scholars, and probably inspired other thieves to follow in their footsteps. And this all took place on March 18, 1990. I'm talking about the Boston Art Heist, aka the Gardner Robbery.

Now the museum in question is a place called the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. And girl, in the months before it was robbed, she was kind of asking for it. Oh, that's not right to say, but kind of. By that I mean security was at an all-time low and not a top priority. Isabella Stewart, the woman who had created and funded the museum, left super strict policies about what should happen to her museum after she died.

So number one was to not rearrange the artwork. It doesn't matter if she's dead. If you move it, she will find out and haunt you, okay? Number two.

No items were to be sold or brought into the museum, so the outside public knew exactly what was in that damn museum at all times. It wasn't just Isabella's super strict will about the artwork that was holding back the museum either. There was also the dusty ass board of directors who had to approve anything new coming into the museum. And worst of all, the Gardner Museum was running low on funds and essentially like falling apart.

There was no climate control system, which is key for museums because certain temperatures can affect how the art is preserved. And the museum had terrible security. There was just a bunch of underpaid guards, literally like kind of just sitting, eating.

It was said that the security system was so bad that it was a running joke among the guards. But still, the people in charge of the museum didn't really take the security concerns seriously. Then in 1982, the FBI reaches out to the museum to let them know they were about to get robbed blind.

Apparently the FBI stopped the robbery just in time, but they wanted the museum to know that they had some major security issues they needed to like figure out. So the museum board decided to actually, you know,

invest in better security. They hired a team of experts to figure out what they needed. They recommended 60 infrared motion detectors, you know, those red lines from spy movies. They got Dodge. And they also suggested installing a television security system connected to four cameras that would surround the museums.

And more guards were hired, but the museum refused to raise their salaries. So I'm guessing their guards weren't exactly like the most qualified, but the board decided to cut corners on one very important feature, cameras inside the damn building. The board said, "No, we don't need cameras inside the building. That would be too expensive." I mean, it was honestly like they were putting a sign that said, "Steal my art."

like in front of the museum, you know? It was bound to happen. And boy, on March 18th, 19- This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner and more.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer survey who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow. Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory. It sure did. So it was the early hours of St. Patrick's Day.

So people were going wild. Everyone is Irish. Around 12:30 AM, things started to go down.

There were several guards working at the Gardiner Museum, doing their usual thing, running the security desk, patrolling with flashlights, chatting on walkie-talkies. You know, walkie-talkies are so fun. Then out of nowhere, fire alarms started sounding off in different rooms of the museums. They were running around trying to figure out what's going on. There's no smoke. It was just a bunch of false alarms.

Or was it? Then around 1:20 AM, the security desk got a ring at their front door. It was two men in uniforms. Let's call them Bert and Ernie because at this moment, we don't know their names. No one ever solved this one, by the way. Sorry to spoil it. The police sketches of them literally look like Bert and Ernie on screen.

Tell me I'm wrong. Exactly. So these two told the museum security guards that they were investigating a quote unquote disturbance. Even though the museum security guards had no idea what they were talking about, it was St. Patrick's Day. I mean, they're like, sure, maybe there's something crazy going on and they just need to do their job. So the officers tell the security guards that they need to gather the rest of the guards in the museum. And as soon as everyone was in the same room, surprise,

Burt and Ernie handcuffed everyone. They told them that they weren't officers, they were thieves, and literally said, quote, "'Gentlemen, this is a robbery.'"

They ended up duct taping the guards eyes and then put duct tape around their hands and then led them to the museum basement where they handcuffed them to steam pipes. So the thieves end up taking their wallets and threatened them saying like, we know where you live so you better not say anything or else. And then they added, hey, if you guys don't tell police about what happened tonight, you can expect a reward in about one year.

Mm-hmm, they're making some kind of promise, whatever. After that, Bert and Ernie, they got to stealing, and they were very specific about where they went in the museum. They first entered the Dutch room on the second floor, and as they entered the room, the museum's notification system started going off. So they smash it and then start their mad grab. They grabbed two paintings, they lifted them off the wall, and immediately they throw them on the ground,

shattering their glass frames. And then they pulled out one of those like sharp exacto knife blades and cut the paintings out of the shattered frames so they'd be easier to transport. I know that part like made me cringe 'cause they cut the literal canvas.

Oh, such a bummer. They moved throughout the Gardiner Museum, taking irreplaceable Degas sketches, Rembrandt and oil paintings on canvas, wood and ancient Chinese artifacts. As soon as they got what they wanted, the two booked it and they were out of there. On the way out of the museum, Bert and Ernie made a quick stop to check on the security guards that were locked in the basement. And they were like, "Hey, you guys, you good down there?"

"All right." And then, yeah, you know. So that was really nice of them. Good for them. Anyway, Bert and Ernie make their last stop on the way out of the museum to take the security tapes, which back then would have been like, you know, the fat VHSs. And they also took a hard drive with all the motion sensor data to try and like cover their tracks. They exit through the side entrance doors and, boof, they were gone, probably heading back to good old Sesame Street.

and they were never heard from again. I mean, all in all, the robbery took 81 minutes and they stole an estimated $500 million worth of paintings, making it the biggest art heist in history. You guys did it, congratulations.

The case to this day remains unsolved and there have never been any arrests made and none of the art has ever been recovered. Epstein's Island, I bet you. So in 2013, the FBI actually revealed that they did have two suspects in mind, but they died shortly after the heist.

Bummer. There were also some investigations done into tracing the art, which was suspected to have disappeared through the black market. But even if that were the case, maybe

Many believe the art would have showed up by now, and it hasn't. To this day, there's a $10 million reward being offered to anyone who has information to help recover this art. I know, I'm like, "What's that phone number and what? I'll paint it real quick." So why would Bert and Ernie do it? Experts who analyzed the heist say it made no sense. None of it makes sense.

First of all, the way they knifed the art out of the frames and smashed the glass, that's something not ideal to do. You know, if you really care about the art, you wouldn't do that. It's a pretty selfish move. And the collection of the art was so random when he put it together. They couldn't have been commissioned to steal it. And if they were selling it to the black market, they probably would have taken way more

and different pieces that were more expensive. I don't know, who knows? To this day, it all remains a mystery. They just took the most random pieces of art and nobody knows why or just why. Most experts agree on one thing, Bert and Ernie had no motivation to steal the art. Now that's a real unsolved mystery. Hey, you two.

Good for you. You'd said that. So yeah, I became a little obsessed about reading about these wild art thefts.

And as I kept digging and digging, I came across this last one. And honestly, it's my favorite because of how it all ended. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

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The day is Sunday, April 27th, 2003, and we are in Manchester, England. You sound like you're from London. It was a typical spring day. Flowers blooming, lovers smooching. But inside the Whitworth Art Gallery, known simply as the Whitworth, it was all about to go down. So it's early in the morning, and the staff at the museum are getting all set up to open their doors to the public. As they're walking through the museum, they stop dead in their tracks.

and then their jaws hit the floor. That's because three paintings were just straight up gone, boof, vanished. And these weren't just finger paintings done by like a local kid. These pieces were prized possessions of the Whitworths. They were done by Van Gogh, Picasso, Gauguin, and their estimated value was $1.6 million.

The staff hauls ass to the telephone and gets the Greater Manchester Police on the phone who starts an investigation. But this turns out to be one of the shortest investigations of all time because that same day the Manchester Police luck out and get an anonymous tip into the whereabouts of these priceless paintings. Acting on the info from the tip, the police show up to this boarded up creepy outdoor public bathroom. Must have smelt too.

And it was less than a quarter mile from the museum. It was literally right down the road. So the police surrounded the boarded up bathroom. They break into it and search the place from top to bottom. Now that's when they find a cardboard tube near the toilet. It rained all the night before. So the cardboard tube was soggy and wet and moist. And you know, huge problem because stuffed inside that tube were those million dollar missing paintings.

Yeah, and they were just not in great shape. So the cops handed over to some museum experts for restoration. Now listen to this. Right next to the tube, the cops also found a note. And this note explained everything. It said, quote, "The intention was not to steal, only to highlight the woeful security." End quote. Translation, your security sucks.

Fix it. You're welcome. Now I googled around to see if they ever caught these thieves and they never did. They never catch these guys because the thief was trying to make a point and not trying to make a profit.

But normally investigators don't catch lucky breaks like this. Art thieves typically want to keep the things they're stealing, you know. But usually it takes years of hard work and investigating to catch art thieves. And the most important thing is that an investigator has a good reason to go after them. Solid motivation. And one man based in New York has exactly that. I'd like to introduce you to Colonel Matthew Bogdanos. This guy is real life G.I. Joe. G.I. Joe!

Body massage. Do you guys remember that? - Body massage. - Body massage. He was a Marine and served for 13 years before he went on to get his law degree. Good for him. In 2003, the United States invaded Iraq high. The entire strategy was called a shock and awe military campaign. And it means exactly what it says. During all the explosions and confusions, bands of looters saw their golden opportunity. While everyone was distracted,

The looters broke into Iraq's National Museum in Baghdad and began stealing everything they could get their hands on. I mean, paintings, statues, artifacts, you name it. They targeted literally anything of value. Kind of like supermarket sweep. They were just going down there like, doo-doo.

Like getting those hams, the diapers. They were always getting tons of diapers on that show. So when the Colonel watched all this stuff play out, all the art theft going on, he said, quote, "It just hit me in my gut like a body blow. This stuff matters. It matters forever." It's funny 'cause he's watching like a war go on and people blow up and he's like, "This matters. It matters forever. And once it's gone, it's gone." End quote. I mean, good for him. Someone's gotta care about the art, you know?

Sure. So the colonel rounded up about a dozen counterterrorism agents, jumped into some military vehicles and said, let's save the art because that is our priority. They drove into downtown Baghdad where the colonel and his crew set up shop in the museum's library. After that, they like secured the windows and the doors and they put the whole place on lockdown.

They planned and carried out armed raids that recovered thousands of pieces over the next few months. And the colonel went on to write a book about it. And he received a bunch of medals and awards for his work. I'm not laughing at him, sorry. I'm just like giggling. So the colonel gets back to America. He goes to work in the district attorney's office in Manhattan, New York. This is where he gets the nickname, The Pit Bull. Mr. Worldwide,

So he gets this nickname because attorneys he went up against said that he was intense, aggressive, and would do anything to win his cases. And nobody wanted to go up against him in court. At the district attorney's office, the colonel created what he has come to be known as Antiquities Trafficking Unit. This Sunday on CBS.

Law and Order, Antiquities Trucking Unit. Dun dun. Now this unit is one of a kind. It's a crew of attorneys, federal agents, investigators, art specialists, and analysis who track down people who try to steal art and sell it for profit. And this brings the Colonel to the doorstep of New York's museum's wealthiest collectors and high-end auction houses where they buy and sell stuff legally.

Quotations around Legolet. Over the past 10 years, the Colonel and the ATU have investigated and recovered more than 3,600 pieces of art and antiquities. In total, are worth more than $200 million. He's busted down doors at art fairs, arrested art dealers in five-star hotels, and even stopped bougie auctions at places like Sotheby's and Christie's. I think of him as like Dog the Bounty Hunter, but for art.

One time, the colonel and his team raided a Christie's auction that was happening in Rockefeller Center. So they swooped to this bougie-ass ballroom where a guy is talking way too fast. Do I hear $50? $50,000 for the horse? Do I hear a woman? Do I hear a woman? And you're like, yeah, same. And then, boof, goes the door. The

the Colonel and his crew are like, stop that sale. Swiper no swipey. So as you can imagine, the wealthy types aren't big fans of the Colonel's work because they're the ones buying the black market art, you know? But the Colonel knew that these were the type of people that he needed to make an example out of.

None of them really cared how they got their art. They didn't even care if it was technically illegal. They just wanted it. So the Colonel's team said, quote, "It showed us the world we're dealing with, like these very wealthy, very powerful, very connected people, some of whom think the law just doesn't apply to them." End quote. I mean, hello? Yeah, we agree. And it wasn't just oil paintings. He even set up a sting operation at a coin convention in 2012.

Yeah, he was going after coins. Dang, I mean, someone's gotta look out for the coins, I guess. The colonel and 10 officers raided the Waldorf Astoria and arrested a guy for trying to sell a stolen rare coin from 400 BC. Holy crap. I mean, he was trying to sell this coin for 300 grand. That's why I'm always looking on the ground because you never know what kind of penny you're gonna find. You know what I'm saying?

I'm always getting the change. I'm like, "Penny, you never know. I do that shit. I don't give a shit. You drop your change, I'll pick it up. Thank you." And even just a few years ago in 2018, the Colonel and his unit uncovered a gold coffin of an Egyptian priest on display at the Met Museum in New York. It was looted and stolen from Egypt. And there's this great picture of Kim Kardashian posing next to it at the Met Gala.

I think she looks great. This coffin is like six feet tall and wrapped in pure shiny gold. But you can just tell this Egyptian coffin is like, it's priceless. And it caught the attention of the colonel because a smuggler who was also an informant gave him a hot tip that the coffin was stolen. So the colonel opened an investigation that uncovered

that the Met actually got the coffin for $4 million, even though they knew it was shady. There was a bunch of red flags, like who they were buying it from. He also found that museum employees allegedly deleted emails at the art dealer's request.

trying to cover what their tracks look like. Because of the Colonel, the coffin was returned to Egypt in 2019. And along with Egypt, the Colonel's investigations have returned art and antiques to a bunch of other countries like Greece, Pakistan, Italy, and India. Long live Mr. Worldwide. I mean Pitbull. To this day, he is investigating and locking up traffickers and returning art to where it belongs. And it gives

Robin Hood of art. Now this episode raises a bunch of interesting questions. For example, where does art belong? The thieves we mentioned earlier think they should have it either for love or for money or some sense of entitlement.

Most of us would probably say art belongs in a museum, right? So the public can access it or study it. And then people like the colonel think, like, it's got to be the right museum. Specifically in the country where it came from would be ideal. But then if that's the case, what are they going to do about big-ass museums like the British Museum that's mostly made up of art that was low-key stolen? Are they just going to give it back? They're not just going to give it back. Come on. They like to be petty. Yeah.

Real petty. I don't know. Some people were like, hey, maybe the art should go back to the descendants of the people who originally owned it, which is an interesting thought. I don't know. It's just a good question. Like where does art belong? Anyways, I would love to know your guys' opinions down below in the comment section or anywhere really, because where does art belong? And let's keep an eye out for that art that's worth like 10 million if you find it. Keep your eyes peeled, everyone. This is a real scavenger hunt.

Find that art! Well, everyone, thank you for learning with me today. Remember, don't be afraid to ask questions and be curious, because life is short and...

Why not? Now, I'd love to hear your guys' reactions to this story. So make sure to use the hashtag dark history over on social media so I can see what you guys are saying. Join me over on my YouTube where you can watch these episodes on Thursday after the podcast airs. And while you're there, you can also catch Murder, Mystery, and Makeup. I hope you have a great rest of your day. You make good choices. And I'll be talking to you next week.

Goodbye. Dark History is an Audioboom original. This podcast is executive produced by Bailey Sarian, Junia McNeely from 3Arts, Kevin Grush, and Claire Turner from Maiden Network.

writers Katie Burrs, Alison Filobos, Joey Scaluzzo, and me, Bailey Sarian. Shot and edited by Tafadzwa Nemarundwe and Lily Young. Research provided by Xander Elmore and the Dark History Researcher team. A special thank you to our expert, Jonathan Petropoulos. And I'm your host, Bailey Sarian. Oh, Joan, I didn't see you. I think Joan is one of the burnt Ernie's. Am I burnt? And you're Ernie?

I'll take it.