HARRINGTON, Del. (AP) – Delaware State police are seeking information on a burglary at a home in Harrington in which eight muskets and four cavalry swords were stolen in June.
The home was broken into again last week, and police believe the crimes are linked.
The first incident was June 28. Intruders pried open a gun cabinet and took the muskets and swords. Some of the items, which belong to a re-enactor who collects Civil War memorabilia, date to the 1840s. They are worth about $28,000.
On Aug. 25, burglars tried to break into the home again. That incident was caught on surveillance video.
Troopers ask that anyone with information about the burglaries call Delaware Crime Stoppers at (800) TIP-3333.
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Vincent van Gogh (Dutch, 1853-1890), Poppy Flowers, also known as Vase with Flowers, stolen from Mahmoud Khalil Museum in Cairo.
CAIRO (AP) – Egypt’s culture minister says he was questioned by prosecutors for three hours over last week’s theft of a Vincent van Gogh painting.
Farouk Hosni told reporters Monday he volunteered for the interrogation to dispel accusations of negligence in the robbery.
Thieves made off with the canvas, known by the titles of Poppy Flowers and Vase with Flowers, from the Mahmoud Khalil Museum in Cairo.
The prosecutor general ordered the detention of Deputy Culture Minister Mohsen Shalaan and four of the museum’s security guards while they are investigated on suspicion of neglect and professional delinquency.
During the late night questioning Sunday, Hosni said he told prosecutors that he had delegated full responsibility for the museum to Shalaan.
No charges have been filed.
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HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) – A Connecticut funeral home director and a co-conspirator are facing two-year prison sentences after pleading guilty to stealing money and other valuables from dead people’s homes.
Kevin Riley, owner of Hartford Trade Services, and Yolanda Faulkner pleaded guilty to several larceny charges Thursday in Hartford Superior Court. Sentencing was set for Nov. 10.
Authorities say Riley and Faulkner stole money, jewelry and paintings from the homes of dead people who had no relatives, after Riley had himself appointed administrator of their estates. Prosecutors say the two sold some of the goods at an auction house where Faulkner was the bookkeeper.
Riley is also facing an order to pay restitution of nearly $63,000, while Faulkner is being ordered to repay about $13,000.
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Information from: The Hartford Courant, http://www.courant.com
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CAIRO (AP) – Egypt’s top prosecutor on Monday ordered the detention of the deputy culture minister for four days in connection with the theft of a Vincent van Gogh painting, state media reported.
Thieves made off with the canvas, known by the titles of Poppy Flowers and Vase with Flowers, on Saturday from the Mahmoud Khalil Museum in Cairo. None of the museum’s alarms and only seven of 43 surveillance cameras were working at the time of the robbery.
The prosecutor general ordered the detention of Deputy Culture Minister Mohsen Shalaan and four of the museum’s security guards while they are investigated on suspicion of neglect and professional delinquency, according to the state-run Middle East News Agency.
No charges have been filed.
The prosecutor, Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud, implicated the deputy minister in the security lapses that he said led to the theft because he has an office in the museum and is in charge of its financial and administrative affairs.
Shalaan “neglected his duties and didn’t improve lax security measures by replacing the broken cameras and alarms,” MENA quoted the prosecutor as saying.
The guards were accused of neglect for not checking museum visitors.
Ten other people were questioned and released Sunday but remain under investigation on similar accusations.
The van Gogh painting is worth an estimated $50 million.
This is the second time the painting by the Dutch postimpressionist has been stolen from the museum. Thieves first made off with the canvas in 1978. Authorities recovered it two years later at an undisclosed location in Kuwait.
The 12-inch-by-12-inch (30-centimer-by-30-centimeter) canvas, believed to have been painted in 1887, resembles a flower scene by the French artist Adolphe Monticelli, whose work deeply affected van Gogh. The Monticelli painting also is part of the Khalil collection.
The prosecutor said his office had warned Egypt’s museums last year to implement stricter security controls after nine paintings were stolen from another Cairo institute, the Mohammed Ali Museum. Similar security lapses were to blame in that theft.
Shalaan, the deputy minister, said he also warned in 2007 that cameras and alarms at the Mahmoud Khalil Museum were not working but that Culture Minister Farouk Hosni did not come through with resources to replace the equipment.
“I am not going to be a scapegoat for the minister,” he was quoted as saying by the weekly Al-Youm Al-Sabaa newspaper.
He said he would present evidence that the minister was aware of the failing security at the museum, according to the paper’s online edition.
Hosni has instructed ministry officials to set up what he described as a central control room to monitor video from surveillance cameras in all Egyptian museums and link alarms into a single network, MENA reported.
The control room will be set up inside Cairo’s historic Citadel, the fortress built by Saladin. Committees will also tour museums across the country to review security measures.
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NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) – Wildlife officers seized two tons of elephant ivory and five rhino horns at Kenya’s main airport that were to be illegally shipped to Malaysia, an official said Tuesday.
Paul Udoto, a spokesman with the Kenya wildlife Service, said sniffer dogs from the KWS inspection unit, based at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, detected the tusks. They were concealed in wooden boxes being transported with avocados and destined for Malaysia.
Two people have been arrested, he said.
Udoto said the 317 pieces of elephant tusk are believed to have been acquired after the deaths of 150 elephant. He estimated that it took 20 years to amass the collection and said it is unlikely the elephants were killed for the tusks but rather that someone collected them from elephants that died naturally.
Udoto said three of Rhino horn had transmitters in them, meaning they were being tracked by wildlife officials.
Airports in Kenya, Ethiopia and South Africa have emerged as the three main airports to smuggle African ivory to Asia, where it is a collector’s item.
Early last month authorities in Thailand netted 1,683 pounds (765 kilograms) that were flown from Kenya. In May, Vietnamese authorities discovered nearly two tons of elephant tusks illegally imported from Kenya hidden in dried seaweed. The shipment was bound for China.
According to wildlife officials, elephant poaching has risen seven-fold in Kenya since a one-time ivory sale was approved in 2007 by CITES – the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species – for four African countries. Last year 271 Kenyan elephants were killed by poachers, compared with 37 in 2007.
CITES banned the sale of ivory in 1989 after poaching devastated the African elephant population from 1.3 million in 1979 to about 600,000 in 1989.
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Photo portrait of photographer Ansel Adams that first appeared in the 1950 Yosemite Field School yearbook. Photo by J. Malcolm Greany.
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) – A group representing Ansel Adams sued a Fresno man Monday for selling prints and posters under the name of the famed nature photographer, the latest salvo in a dispute over glass negatives bought at a garage sale and purported to be Adams’ lost work.
The lawsuit, filed in federal district court in San Francisco by The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust, seeks to stop Rick Norsigian and consulting firm PRS Media Partners from using Adams’ name, likeness and trademark in their efforts to sell prints and posters not authorized or endorsed by the Trust.
The suit alleges trademark infringement, false advertising, trademark dilution, unfair competition and other claims. It does not specify damages but asks the court to order the defendants to pay restitution of their profits from any sales, as well as award any other monetary relief.
Norsigian’s lawyer, Arnold Peter, said the lawsuit has no merit and is designed to harass his client and “silence this debate.”
“We are disappointed that the Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust has decided to resort to the courts in order to resolve what, in our view, is a debate that should be resolved by art and forensic experts,” Peter said in a statement.
Norsigian says he bought the negatives 10 years ago at a Fresno garage sale for $45. He noticed they resembled Adams’ famed photographs of Yosemite National Park and hired Peter to assemble a team of experts to authenticate them.
Last month, Peter announced that his team studied the 65 negatives for six months and concluded “beyond a reasonable doubt” that the photos were Adams’ early work, believed to have been destroyed in a 1937 fire at his Yosemite studio.
Norsigian has set up a website to sell prints made from some of the negatives, from $45 for a poster to $7,500 for a darkroom print with a certificate of authenticity. A Beverly Hills art gallery owned by David W. Streets plans to hold a public viewing of part of the collection next month.
Adams’ representatives have never bought the claim, calling it a fraud. The lawsuit is the latest action to stop what they believe is a scam.
“I’m sure Ansel never would’ve imagined a scam on this scale,” said Bill Turnage, the Trust’s managing director. “I never thought it would come to this, but we have to try to do our duty to protect his work and reputation.”
The suit also says there is “substantial evidence” suggesting the negatives were created by another photographer, Earl Brooks, whose niece came forward just days after Peter’s announcement to say she had a photo of her uncle’s that looked identical to one of the negatives.
The lawsuit further says that even if they were Adams’ negatives, the prints and posters being created from them aren’t the photographer’s works, “but are derivative works at best.”
“Mr. Adams was fond of likening a negative to a composer’s score and the prints to its performance – each performance differs in subtle ways,” the lawsuit said. “The photographic prints and posters offered for sale by defendants … are not an Ansel Adams ‘performance.’ “
The suit says the defendants are improperly and unlawfully trading on Adams trademark and deliberately confusing consumers.
Adams established the Trust in 1976 to protect the integrity of his work and preserve his artistic legacy.
Adams’ black-and-white photographs, primarily of the American West, are widely reproduced on calendars and posters and in coffee-table books, while his prints are coveted by collectors. His print Clearing Winter Storm, Yosemite National Park brought $722,500 at auction this summer in New York, a record for 20th century photography.
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Shepard Fairey posed with the ‘HOPE’ poster at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston last February. Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons.
NEW YORK (AP) – A March trial date was set Monday to decide whether the artist who created the Barack Obama “HOPE” image violated the Associated Press’ copyright when he based the image on one of the news agency’s pictures.
U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein said Monday that the selection of eight jurors for a three-week trial will start March 21 in New York.
Artist Shepard Fairey appeared in court with his lawyers Monday but declined to comment afterward. Fairey sued the AP last year, arguing that his artwork during Obama’s 2008 run for the presidency did not violate AP’s copyrights.
The news cooperative countersued, saying the uncredited, uncompensated use of its picture violated copyright laws.
One of Fairey’s lawyers, Geoffrey Stewart, told the judge that Fairey will show at trial how he made the Obama image, calling it a work of art based on one photograph.
“This isn’t like some copyright case that involves hundreds of this and hundreds of that,” he said. “It’s really quite simple.”
An AP lawyer, Michael Williams, told the judge that Fairey’s recent deposition statement that he believed he created the Obama image from a portion of a photograph that included the actor George Clooney with Obama was inconsistent with Fairey’s lawsuit, which said there were two photographs and that a photograph of Obama without Clooney wasn’t used.
Stewart told the judge he disagreed with the AP’s “characterization of the record.”
Earlier this year, it was disclosed in court that Fairey is under criminal investigation after he said he erred about which AP photo he used as a basis for “HOPE.” He acknowledged that he based his artwork on a picture of Obama that did not include Clooney and that he had submitted false images and deleted other images to conceal his actions.
The red, cream and light-blue “HOPE” images show a determined-looking Obama gazing upward, with the caption “HOPE.”
The AP photographs were taken in 2006 when Obama, then a senator, was seated next to Clooney at a press event in Washington.
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FAIRFAX, Vt. (AP) – Vermont State Police say burglars made off with a butter churn and several pieces of pottery at the Fairfax Historical Society in Fairfax.
The items were taken sometime between Tuesday and Sunday.
Anyone with information is being asked to contact State Police in St. Albans, at (802) 524-5993.
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A surveillance camera caught this image of one of the suspects, a white male with dark hair, approximately 6ft. tall with a medium build. Image courtesy of Mel Fisher Maritime Museum.KEY WEST, Fla. (AP) – Two thieves entered a museum shortly after closing time and stole a gold bar worth about $550,000 that had been recovered from the shipwreck of a Spanish galleon off the Florida Keys, police said.
Police and the FBI are working to identify the suspects who took the gold bar Wednesday afternoon from the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum, where it had been on display for more than 20 years.
The gold bar had been locked in a see-through case that allowed visitors to touch and lift it, while keeping it secure. Security footage shows the suspects breaking into the case after the museum closed for the night, police said.
The bar was recovered from the Santa Margarita shipwreck in 1980 by the late Key West shipwreck salvor Mel Fisher and his crew, while searching for the Santa Margarita and Nuestra Senora de Atocha galleons.
The Spanish ships – loaded with gold, silver and jewelry – were two of eight to sink during a 1622 hurricane. According to the museum’s website, a fleet of 28 ships had left Havana bound for Spain, all packed with treasure.
“Everybody who comes to the museum is encouraged to lift the gold bar and to have a firsthand experience with history,” said Melissa Kendrick, the museum’s executive director. “This is one of the most iconic and best known objects in the museum.”
Kendrick said the museum’s insurance company is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the return of the 74.85-ounce bar.
One suspect is described as a white male, about six feet tall with dark hair and a medium build, the Key West Police reported. The second suspect is about five feet, six inches tall.
“The security systems worked because we knew the bar was stolen within 10 minutes, and we have usable video and photos for law enforcement,” Kendrick said. “The museum made a decision to designate this as a handling object, allowing people to touch the artifact, and this was part of the risk involved in granting public access.”
The museum and associated Mel Fisher Maritime Heritage Society are an internationally recognized center for excavation, preservation, research and exhibition of New World maritime artifacts.
The museum holds the richest single collection of 17th-century maritime and shipwreck antiquities in the Western Hemisphere, including treasures and artifacts from the Atocha and Santa Margarita.
Much of both galleons’ precious cargo was recovered in the 1970s and 1980s under the leadership of Fisher, founder of the society and museum, who died in 1998. The search for artifacts, treasures and other items from the vessels continues to be directed by his family.
Anyone with information about the robbery or suspects is asked to call Key West Police Department at 305-809-1111.
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AP-ES-08-19-10 1938EDT
ADDITIONAL IMAGES OF NOTE
This is the second suspect photo’d by a surveillance camera. He is described as being approximately 5ft. 6in. tall. Image courtesy of Mel Fisher Maritime Museum.
Vincent van Gogh (Dutch, 1853-1890), Poppy Flowers, also known as Vase with Flowers, stolen from Mahmoud Khalil Museum in Cairo.CAIRO (AP) – Egypt’s culture minister on Saturday retracted his claim that police had recovered a van Gogh painting stolen from a Cairo museum, saying it was based on inaccurate information and that the search for the canvas continues.
The minister, Farouk Hosni, said earlier Saturday that police had confiscated the painting from an Italian couple at Cairo airport hours after it was lifted from the Mahmoud Khalil Museum in the Egyptian capital.
But Hosni later backtracked, telling a national television news program that “the statement was based on information we received that was false and incorrect.” He said authorities are still searching for the missing painting, which goes by two titles: Poppy Flowers and Vase with Flowers. Hosni said the piece is valued at around $50 million.
It was not clear what caused the confusion over the artwork’s fate, and officials could not be immediately contacted to clarify. Egypt’s top prosecutor says security lapses are to blame for the theft of a Vincent van Gogh painting from a Cairo museum.
Prosecutor general Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud says none of the alarms and only seven out of 43 surveillance cameras at the Mahmoud Khalil Museum were functioning Saturday when the painting was stolen. He told Egypt’s state news agency Sunday that security at the museum was generally “superficial.”
This is the second time this painting by the Dutch-born Post-impressionist has been stolen from the Khalil museum. Thieves first made off with the canvas in 1978, before authorities recovered it two years later at an undisclosed location in Kuwait.
Officials have never fully revealed the details of that theft. When it was recovered, Egypt’s then-interior minister said three Egyptians involved in the heist had been arrested and informed police where the canvas was hidden. Authorities never reported whether the thieves were charged or tried.
The 12-inch-by-12-inch (30-centimer-by-30-centimeter) canvas, believed to have been painted in 1887, resembles a flower scene by the French artist Adolphe Monticelli, whose work deeply affected van Gogh. The Monticelli painting also is part of the Khalil collection.
Most of the works for which van Gogh is remembered were painted in 29 months of frenzied activity before his suicide in 1890 at age 37.
The Cairo canvas is significant because it represents a turning point in van Gogh’s painting style, said Conor Jordan, the head of impressionist and modern art at Christie’s auction house in New York.
“It shows him assimilating the influences of the French avant-garde after having arrived in 1886 (from Amsterdam), absorbing as much as possible the current trend of French painting,” Jordan told the Associated Press. He added that it was a time when van Gogh was “immersed in this wonderful new world of color.”
Jordan said that van Gogh’s work has a particular “resonance” with the public today, and the story of his turbulent life and career carries a powerful message that helps makes his work so coveted around the world.
Other works in the Khalil museum’s collection, all from the 19th-century French school, are by Paul Gauguin, Gustave Courbet, Francois Millet, Claude Monet, Edouard Manet, Auguste Renoir and Auguste Rodin.
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