Sweden's sky-high national treasure case was solved, and the thief was acquitted

Rembrandt van Rhein was one of the greatest painters of the 17th century in Europe, and his 1630 self-portrait is a masterpiece of astonishing genius – a self-portrait by a 24-year-old young Dutch artist, full of lifelike energy and sentimentality. The painting is considered a national treasure by the Swedes.

　　On Christmas Eve 2008, the painting, along with two famous paintings by the French Impressionist painter Renoir, was stolen from the Swedish National Museum and became the focus of media attention for a while.

　　In November 2013, the Swedish media hailed it as "the most suspenseful theft of the 21st century in Europe", and it was finally solved after five years. On June 12, 2014, Robert Whitman, the former FBI who was in charge of the investigation, revealed to The New York Times the process of solving the case.

　　The famous painting was robbed, and the god probed out of the horse

　　On the afternoon of December 22, 2008, the streets were sparsely populated, and the Swedish National Museum in the center of the city was about to close, when suddenly, three robbers rushed into the museum with guns, "Bang! Bang! Bang! "Three gunshots shattered the quiet and peaceful of the city.

　　"Merry Christmas, gentlemen and ladies! Santa Claus commands you to lie on the ground and not to move. "After firing a gun, one of the gangsters pointed a pistol at the head of a guard. The people present were immediately frightened and had to obediently lie on the ground according to the words of the three gangsters wearing ski masks, and did not dare to raise their heads.

　　Using a wire-breaking tong, one of the gangsters quickly removed one of the museum's most valuable oil paintings, the Self-Portrait of Rembrandt, from the wall and put the painting of less than 8 centimeters into a box. Subsequently, he "by the way" took off the two paintings next to him and handed them to another gangster. "Happy Christmas to all!" As soon as the words stopped, the three gangsters quickly left the scene.

　　In just 10 minutes, the most daring art theft of the century was "completely" successful, and the suspect escaped.

　　In the following days, news of the theft of Rembrandt's self-portraits appeared in the newspapers: three armed bandits snatched a self-portrait by the Dutch painter Rembrandt and two paintings by the French Impressionist painter Renoir, entitled Dialogue and The Girl of Paris, in full view of the public. The price of the three paintings is $120 million. Among them, the self-portrait from 1630 is considered a national treasure by the Swedes.

　　In search of their homeland, the Swedes sought out Robert Whitman, then head of the FBI's art crime team. According to Whitman's empirical analysis, this is a long-planned robbery, and the bandits are familiar with the road and accurately design the course of action. And their goal is clearly to go straight to "Self-Portrait", which shows that there are already buyers booking, because it is impossible to sell such famous paintings publicly, and even if they are auctioned in public, the price will be greatly reduced. Another possibility is also excluded, namely having the museum pay a ransom to ransom the painting. Obviously this seems to be an illegal and very stupid act.

　　According to experience, Whitman believes that the three paintings that were robbed must be dormant on the black market for at least five years to appear!

　　But things were a big surprise to Whitman. Just a week after the crime, he heard an informant say that someone on a black market in Florida had bought the robbed "Self-Portrait" for 20 million yuan.

　　Through the cooperation of the local police, Whitman soon learned the information of the "local tycoon" buyer, an upstart who made computer equipment in China and the United States, named Steven. Whitman approached Steven as an art connoisseur and asked to see the painting. When Whitman saw Steven's Self-Portrait, he looked at it in detail and concluded that it was a fake. But no matter from the composition of the paint, the painting method is exactly the same as the original painting, the production is very professional, if you tell others that this is the real handiwork, no one dares to conclude that it is fake. To keep Steven steady, Whitman lied: "This is indeed Rembrandt's real handiwork, can you tell me the seller's information?" Steven said: "I don't know his name, he is called clairvoyance by the industry, very mysterious, he said he knew the whereabouts of each stolen famous painting, and he had half the number of famous paintings in his hands." ”

　　Over the next three years, Whitman traveled the world, met many "big fat sheep" like Steven, witnessed many "beautifully crafted" self-portraits that were fake, and the sellers they revealed were all clairvoyant, and the descriptions of clairvoyance varied.　

　Follow the vine to touch the melon and lock the thief

　　In August 2013, the case took a turn for the better. A German lawyer named Eric Antonio wrote to Whitman saying he knew the whereabouts of the painting.

　　After paying the 20 million yuan information fee in full, it did not take long for the Swedish authorities to discover the Dialogue through the clues provided by Antonio. When Whitman arrived at an antique shop in a small town in eastern Denmark, he recognized Dialogue at a glance in a large pile of fake paintings, so he used the walkie-talkie to give orders to the police officers who had already been ambushed. Just as the police force rushed into the store, a group of people rushed out from outside and attacked the police force.

　　After some fighting, 13 people were arrested. It turned out that the 13 people were a gang selling fakes, thinking that Whitman had come to "fight counterfeiting". In fact, they did not know that the Dialogue was genuine, because when the goods were received, the seller told them that it was a fake painting and was worthless.

　　I didn't expect that the robbed famous painting could be retrieved so easily, which is incredible! This Antonio must have been involved in a robbery. But during the review, Antonio said: "I happened to find this painting from their fake shop that it was authentic, so I thought of this good deal." ”

　　At present, there is still no clue, and the other two paintings are still nowhere to be found. Unable to do so, Whitman found the German lawyer again and paid 20 million to buy information on another Renoir painting.

　　This painting is in Los Angeles. At 3 p.m. on September 25, 2013, Whitman led people to arrest a suspected drug trafficker member of a Eurasian crime syndicate in a slum. In the drug dealer's home, there is a painting of a woman with a bow around her neck. After scanning the photos and checking the database, this painting is "Paris Girl".

　　Why is the German lawyer's message so correct? If the first painting is something he happened to see, what is the explanation for the clues of the second painting? Half a month later, Whitman offered to find Antonio. This time, he was invited to the FBI.

　　Whitman didn't want to pay any more "information fees," and he told his lawyers directly, "Tell me the whereabouts of Self-Portrait and I'll let you go, or you'll be penniless." After some interrogation, the German lawyer said that a mysterious phone call was made to him, telling him the whereabouts of the two paintings, and asking him to legally ask the police for information fees, as for the 60 million yuan of information fees, he only got 1 million yuan, and the remaining 59 million were handed over to the mysterious person. The mysterious man called himself "clairvoyant", "I can see what I do for him, and if I tell the truth, I will invite the disaster of killing." ”

　　Clairvoyance! This mysterious man must have been behind the robbery. Whitman analysis: In order to hide its eyes and ears, Clairvoyance has been selling fake paintings for the past 5 years. Now, he's starting to get rid of his real paintings in his own unique form — selling them for $60 million in information fees!

　　Antonio also confessed that he had been doing things for Clairvoyant, and Clairvoyant gave him orders over the phone and hinted to him that he would sell the most valuable Self-Portrait next.

Trap the real culprit, and the water will come out

　　Whitman plays an artist from the United States who first goes to Germany to connect with people who know clairvoyants and buy fakes that look very rough.

　　On the morning of November 15, 2013, Whitman stayed at the hotel under a pseudonym, as usual, with forged travel documents. But he intuitively felt that someone was following him.

　　That night, a note was crammed into the crack of his room door with the three words "self-portrait." For three days in a row, and without knowing when, he received three notes from the crack in the door, "Wait for news" and "See you at the bar."

　　Finally, on the fourth day, Whitman arrives at a bar with $20 million in cash brought from the United States to buy Self-Portrait. Finally met clairvoyant, a gentleman with a gentle demeanor.

　　After Whitman gave Clairvoyance money, Clairvoyant led him out of the bar and walked for more than an hour, bypassing three blocks. During their walk, the people of Whitman and the people of clairvoyance followed them from a distance. Eventually, they came to a hotel. Clairvoyant opened the bag for Whitman to see, which was all too familiar, and sure enough, it was Rembrandt's Self-Portrait. "Deal!" Whitman spoke out loud to clairvoyant excitedly.

　　The door slammed open, and "deal" was a code word between Whitman and the police outside the door. Danish police poured in. Clairvoyant smiled coldly, "Sir, what crime have I committed?" Whitman fixed his eyes on the "Self-Portrait" that he thought was a real handiwork, which was also fake. Whitman had some kind of breakdown. He stabilized God: "Isn't it also a sin to sell fakes as real goods?" ”

　　During the interrogation, Whitman asked the truth from the mouth of the "clairvoyant". "Clairvoyance", named Fedris, started by selling counterfeit art, is good at transfiguration, and has now created an industrial chain of fake artworks. "I have bought and sold thousands of famous paintings every year, of course, these are fakes."

　　In 2007, Fedris just used the news of some famous painting thefts to sell his fakes, which didn't sell well. Buyers often puncture his lies, which makes him embarrassed. So Federis decided that he must get a painting out of the real gun and make it disappear, so that the buyer could not suspect that he was getting a fake.

　　So, on Christmas Eve of the following year, Fidris hired a murderer to rob the Swedish National Museum. "I never thought of selling the real thing. The real thing is really too bad to sell, and it's as embarrassing as a piping hot stove. So, before the crime, he sent people to visit the original works at the Swedish National Museum, copied and manufactured a number of fakes, and shipped them abroad before committing the robbery. At that time, he was displayed in front of customs in the name of a replica, and customs would release it without thinking, because Swedish imitations are so common.

　　When the real thing was robbed, Federis sold the imitation, holding the headlines to trick the buyer into saying that it was a masterpiece he personally plucked from the museum wall. Federis also first targeted buyers as upstarts or collectors who didn't know anything about art, and his income from selling a lot of fakes far exceeded the value of the real ones.

　　As for how the three paintings were handled? "Two of the paintings were not very valuable, and I asked my men to sell them to a country fake shop, and when the time was ripe, I would find a stupid lawyer to 'sell' the paintings." And that "Self-Portrait", I didn't shoot it at all, but hid it, so that no one suspected that my fake was fake! ”

　　Then, Federius refused to account for the whereabouts of the famous painting, because it was his amulet. Eventually Whitman makes a deal with him: tell the police the whereabouts of Self-Portrait and he will be acquitted!

　　After Fidris confessed, "Self-Portrait" was finally found!

　　It turned out that the self-portrait had not left the National Museum of Sweden at the time of the crime, and Fedris ordered the gangsters to embed the "small" "Self-Portrait" behind a famous painting — the most dangerous place was the safest place, until Whitman found the "Self-Portrait" behind the painting.

In court, Mr. Federis's allegations were overturned by his lawyers on the grounds that he was being "fished by the police"—Whitman and the Swedish police deliberately used heavy sums of money to buy "Self-Portrait" fakes and conceal their police identities, luring Federis into engaging in counterfeit trafficking, thus arresting him.

　　After trial, Fidris was eventually acquitted. This is the result of a theft case. At 10 a.m. on March 12, 2014, Rembrandt's self-portrait was hung again in the Swedish National Museum.