Mafia Involvement Feared in Heist of Renaissance Paintings in Sicily
Authorities suspect mafia involvement after thieves escaped with four Antonello da Messina works valued at up to €80 million, officials said.
- On Saturday, thieves stole three panels from the Polittico di San Gregorio and a fourth painting from the Regional Museum of Messina, evading security systems during the Ferragosto national holiday.
- Renaissance master Antonello created the Polittico di San Gregorio for a Monastero di San Gregorio destroyed in the 1908 Messina earthquake, making these the only surviving works by the artist remaining in his hometown.
- Authorities later found two panels abandoned outside the Regional Museum, prompting suspicions of mafia involvement given the rapid, professional bypass of alarm systems.
- Messina culture official Enzo Caruso described the theft as a "very, very strange affair," suggesting the paintings might be ransomed or used as collateral in criminal dealings rather than sold.
- Italy's art crime squad is investigating the theft amid national anxiety, while museum director Marisa Mercurio stated the loss of these culturally significant works is impossible to measure in purely economic terms.
13 Articles
13 Articles
There are paintings on the street. It is so with a call to 112 that the first investigations have taken on the resounding theft of the evening of Ferragosto of the six works of Antonello da Messina from MuMe. Coordinated by the head of the mobile team Simone Scalzo, the policemen continue to view all the surveillance cameras that are [...] The article "There are pictures on the street" , the phone call that warns of the the theft of the works of…
The voice is that of Elisabetta Bonfato, the woman who first found herself in front of the two tables of Antonello da Messina abandoned on the sidewalk of the Mume Museum on the evening of August. It has just passed nine o'clock in the evening. At the other end of the telephone the police officer on duty to the police station. "What is the emergency?" he asks. Perhaps he never imagined he had to face one of the most resounding art thefts of rece…
Custodians facing disciplinary action after Renaissance artworks nabbed in Sicilian museum heist
Disciplinary proceedings are expected against several custodians present during a theft at the Museo Regionale di Messina (MuMe), which ended with thieves stealing four works attributed to the 15th-century Italian Renaissance painter Antonello da Messina.
Messina (ITALPRESS) "The chief prosecutor of Messina, Antonio D'Amato, does not exclude that behind the the theft of the works ofAntonello al MuMe there may also be organized crime of the mafia type. "We are wondering if on this blow there is also the work, the involvement of organized crime of the mafia type, historically interested in the theft of the works of art" explains D'Amato.The investigators are working on several fronts and are also v…
Mafia Involvement Feared in Heist of Renaissance Paintings in Sicily
The theft of four paintings by Renaissance master Antonello da Messina from a Sicilian museum has prompted suspicions of mafia involvement, given the startling speed and ease of the high-stakes crime, Italian authorities said on Monday. “It’s a very, very strange affair,” Messina’s top culture official, Enzo Caruso, told Reuters, detailing the troubling circumstances: The thieves broke into the Regional Museum of Messina on the night of Augus…
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