A matter of a few paintings
Odd story about an art heist and the fencing of some of the pieces.
From
SF Gate:
Perfect heist falls apart when loot is offered to the victim of burglary
It looked like the perfect crime.
Starting on Christmas Eve, a ring of thieves -- mistaken by neighbors as a moving crew -- removed $2.5 million in art, antiques and rugs from a Jackson Street mansion in San Francisco's Presidio Heights, taking two truckloads of loot without being detected.
It took months of planning to execute but afterward just days to become a perfect mess -- when one of the burglars decided to try to sell back some of the loot to the victim, who happened to be an heir to the Schlage lock company, one of the biggest makers of locks and security systems in the country.
The man who police say boasted of being the brains behind the caper, James Reem, 42, was arrested Jan. 12 and is in custody on $100,000 bail on grand theft charges.
"This was a not a simple burglary of opportunity -- this is basically a heist," said San Francisco burglary inspector Denise Fabbri, who described Reem as a longtime criminal and drug addict who recently relapsed after being sober for five years. "He almost bragged that he organized it, but he basically lost control."
Reem told investigators he got the idea for a big hit at the Jackson Street mansion after committing a smaller burglary there in September in which he got away with small furniture, candlesticks, jewelry, figurines and other valuables worth about $100,000.
He soon learned that his once and future victim was Robert Kendrick, grandson of the co-founder of Schlage lock, said Fabbri, and then went about assembling a burglary team, one by one, each member known to Reem but not the others.
And then things start to get loopy:
On Dec. 27, a member of the ring -- a man police don't want to name pending further investigation -- inexplicably went back to the Kendrick mansion and knocked on the front door, Fabbri said.
"He said he had been to the flea market, and he saw property there that doesn't belong in a flea market,'' Kendrick said, recalling his astonishment. "He said he traced it from what he saw to where I lived."
Kendrick said the man offered to go back to the flea market, on Alemany Boulevard, and retrieve the stolen property. Indeed, he came back an hour later with some coins and a Kendrick family book of etchings, said Kendrick.
But when he returned, a second individual, who turned out to be Reem, was with him and started lecturing Kendrick about how poorly he had secured his home, said Kendrick.
"He said: 'You don't take proper care of your property,' " Kendrick said. "They gave me my (ex-) wife's etchings and a bottle of wine, Pinot Grigio."
Kendrick said he called police and told them he planned to do a bit of investigating of his own by visiting the same flea market that Sunday.
When he did, Kendrick said, he ran into Reem and saw a U-Haul truck -- the same kind his neighbors had said they had seen during the Christmas burglary -- parked in one of the flea market sales stalls.
"One of them said 'Hello Robert' when I walked by -- it was Reem," Kendrick said.
Kendrick said he saw a tire and speakers in the back of the U-Haul that he thought could be his. But the two still chatted amiably, he said.
An hour later, after walking around the market, Kendrick peered back into the truck, saw an electric blanket that had come from his home -- and called police, he said.
The only thing that comes to mind is WTF??? Reem had a fence lined up, why re-introduce himself (and his team) to the victim.
Filed under: 'Stupid Criminal'
Posted by DaveH at January 23, 2007 7:59 PM