Seven years after an undercover sting led police to a home filled with stolen artwork within the hills above Good, France, the case has returned to court docket, with ten defendants now on trial over a cache that included a number of works by Pablo Picasso.
The trial, which opened earlier this month in Good, revisits a 2017 judicial police operation that recovered greater than 20 stolen artworks, together with a minimum of seven works by Picasso, following a tip that main items had been being quietly provided on the market on the Côte d’Azur.
Based on reporting by French newspaper Good-Matin, investigators from the Police Judiciaire went undercover, posing as a Swiss purchaser and his assistant, after receiving intelligence from Belgium that stolen artworks had been circulating domestically. The officers organized a gathering at a lodge in Good, the place a vendor allegedly proposed a multimillion-euro money deal, earlier than main them to a home within the village of Peillon, north of the town.
Contained in the Peillon property, police stated they found what amounted to a non-public show of stolen artwork. Among the many works recognized had been Picasso’s Le vieux roi and Le clown, together with different work, sculptures, and objects later tied to a collection of thefts earlier that yr.
A number of of the recovered works had been traced to a housebreaking in Saint-Paul-de-Vence in October 2017 and an armed theft in Èze the next month, in line with Good-Matin. Investigators additionally seized money, cellphones, and paperwork that authorities stated helped hyperlink particular works to particular crimes.
On the time of the restoration, a number of people linked to the Peillon property had been positioned below formal investigation on suspicion of dealing with stolen items. Earlier reporting by Europe 1 described the case as involving a suspected resale operation geared toward discreetly transferring stolen artworks by means of personal channels reasonably than public markets.
The present proceedings consolidate these earlier investigations right into a single trial involving ten defendants, whom prosecutors accuse of collaborating in or benefiting from a broader artwork theft and fencing community working within the area. Native media report that the court docket is analyzing whether or not the Peillon home functioned as a storage and gross sales hub for stolen works taken from a number of places.
A verdict is anticipated on January 19, which can deliver higher readability concerning the full scope of the thefts and the paths the recovered works took earlier than being intercepted by police.
For investigators, the Peillon restoration provided a uncommon glimpse into how stolen masterpieces can linger in plain sight. The decision in Good might decide how way more of that image comes into focus.
