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BOSTON — In 1990, Richard Abath was a 23-year-old self-described hippie and guitarist for a rock band named Ukiah who, while moonlighting as a security guard, allowed two thieves posing as police officers to enter the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum here. For 25 years, his decision to buzz in the men who carted away $500 million worth of art has been largely treated as the hapless act of a rookie watchman who fell for a bluff. But on Thursday, federal officials still investigating the art heist — the largest in American history — drew fresh attention to Mr. Abath’s actions...

ROME -- Italian police have recovered a rare statue of a Roman emperor who co-ruled alongside Marcus Aurelius and was known for his reluctance to sit for portraits. Police said Friday that the marble head of Lucius Verus was the most spectacular find among more than a dozen looted ancient artifacts hidden in a boat garage near Rome. The bearded visage of Lucius Verus is believed to have been secretly unearthed at a site in the Naples area and was probably destined for the international market, said Capt. Massimo Rossi of a special police unit that hunts down archaeological thieves....

AP News Alert ZURICH, Switzerland (AP) - Police say armed robbers steal art worth $100 million from a Zurich museum.

Excerpt - Academy Award-winning director and producer Steven Spielberg has turned over to federal authorities Russian Schoolroom, a 1967 oil on canvas by Norman Rockwell that was filched from a Clayton art gallery in 1973, according to the FBI. No charges have been filed in the case, and federal officials say they have no evidence that Spielberg knew the painting had been stolen when he purchased it in 1989. "It appears that he is an innocent buyer," says St. Louis-based FBI agent Frank Brostrom, a member of the agency's Art Crime Team, who initiated the investigation. Spielberg is an avid...

PARIS (Feb. 28) - At least two Picasso paintings, worth a total of nearly $66 million, were stolen from the artist's granddaughter's house in Paris, police said Wednesday. The paintings, "Maya and the Doll" and "Portrait of Jacqueline," disappeared overnight Monday to Tuesday from the chic 7th arrondissement, or district, a Paris police official said. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said they were worth nearly $66 million. The director of the Picasso Museum, Anne Baldassari, said several paintings and drawings were stolen from the home of Diana Widmaier-Picasso....

Investigators in the US have launched a fresh attempt to solve the world's biggest art robbery, in which hundreds of millions of dollars worth of works by Rembrandt, Vermeer and others were stolen from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Eric Ives, the head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's major theft unit, said he planned to appeal for information about the 1990 theft through a billboard campaign next year across the US and possibly even in London. The plan highlights the FBI's tightening focus on art crimes and its enthusiasm to solve a notorious case that has dogged its reputation...

Edvard Munch’s paintings “The Scream” and “Madonna,” which two armed robbers yanked from the wall of a museum here in August 2004, were recovered in relatively good condition in Norway today. No new arrests were made today, and the case remains far from solved, although three of six men charged in the theft were found guilty earlier this year of minor roles. The police said little after confirming that the late-19th-century Expressionist pictures were safe. But Norwegians rejoiced in the return of two of their most treasured artworks. “We’re open for Champagne tonight to anyone who wants to come by...

The revelation that St. Petersburg's renowned Hermitage Museum had been systematically robbed of 221 precious art objects has underscored yet again the vulnerability of Russia's cultural treasures. PRAGUE, August 7, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- It has all the elements of a classic mystery novel. Hundreds of icons and precious objects worth an estimated $5 million are systematically stolen from Russia's most storied art museum, the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. The majority of the items, it becomes clear, were taken from a single storeroom -- whose guardian, a curator identified as Larisa Zavadskaya, died suddenly late last year. Museum officials bring in...

Michael J. Mullen/Scranton Times-Tribune, via Associated PressEverhart Museum of Natural History, Science and Art in Scranton, Pa. Everhart Museum, via Associated Press"Winter in Springs," a drip painting attributed to Jackson Pollock. EAST HAMPTON, N.Y. — Unlike the problem posed in 2003, when a cache of 32 supposed Jackson Pollocks was found in a storage bin on Long Island, this Pollock problem began when a painting attributed to the artist suddenly disappeared. About 2 a.m. on Nov. 18, 2005, "Winter in Springs," a 40-by-32-inch drip painting attributed to Pollock, was stolen from the Everhart Museum of Natural History, Science and...

ALARM - Flights of works of Picasso, Monet, Dali and Matisse with the museum of Rio RIO OF JANEIRO - works of El Salvador Dali, Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse and Claude Monet were flights Friday in a museum of Rio by a group of men armed which moreover attacked foreign tourists, according to the museum.

A suspect in the theft of a $60 million Renaissance figurine turned himself in and police said Saturday they had recovered the object, stolen almost three years ago from an Austrian museum. The Austria Press Agency said experts had established the authenticity of the figurine - the 16th century, gold-plated "Saliera," or salt cellar sculpture by the Florentine master Benvenuto Cellini. The sculpture, buried in a wooden case, was found near Zwettl, a town about 55 miles north of Vienna, said the official, who would not identify himself on the phone in accordance with Austrian practice. He said the man,...

In a bizarre twist to a 15-year-old mystery, two Boston FBI agents are in Paris this week probing whether an indicted French media mogul knows the whereabouts of art heisted from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in March 1990, the Herald has learned. According to an American art dealer and historian, the agents want access to French legal records surrounding the arrest of Jean-Marie Messier, the embattled former CEO of the entertainment conglomerate Vivendi-Universal. The art expert, who spoke on condition of anonymity, was present for six hours on Tuesday when the FBI agents and a French prosecutor discussed whether...