[CPProt.net] Art thief released from prison. Claims new data on Gardner probe

[MSN CPPnet (Ton Cremers)]

Art thief released from prison
Claims new data on Gardner probe
By Shelley Murphy and Stephen Kurkjian, Globe Staff  |  December 8, 2005

Shortly after he was released from prison yesterday, convicted art thief
Myles J. Connor Jr. said he will try again to broker the return of the $300
million in masterpieces stolen in 1990 from the Isabella Stewart Gardner
Museum in Boston.

An FBI spokeswoman said agents were interested in talking to Connor about
his statement that he has new information, but Connor said he's going to try
to get the 13 paintings, including a Vermeer and three Rembrandts, back on
his own.

As he left federal court in Boston after being freed by a judge, Connor, 62,
of Blackstone, said that hypnosis has helped him recover memories he lost
after a 1998 heart attack and that he now remembers the name of a middleman
who allegedly arranged the theft on behalf of a secret buyer.

Connor wouldn't name the man, but said that he lives in Massachusetts and
that he plans to contact him in an effort to retrieve the artwork.

''We would be interested in talking to Mr. Connor about this information,"
said Gail Marcinkiewicz, a spokeswoman for the FBI, adding that agents are
interested in information from anyone about the disappearance of the
artwork.

But Connor said he will pursue his own leads, now that he no longer has
restrictions on where he travels or whom he talks to.

''I think I can use my connections and powers of persuasion to make the case
that has to be made," said Connor, who added that he doesn't know who
commissioned the theft, but believes it was an eccentric collector who
probably still has the artwork.

In March Connor was arrested for allegedly driving the getaway car for a
friend who robbed a Natick jewelry store. The arrest led federal authorities
to take Connor back into custody for allegedly violating the conditions set
when he was released in June 2000 after serving 11 years in prison on drug
and stolen art charges not related to the Gardner theft. Connor was in
prison when the Gardner artwork was stolen.

Yesterday, US District Judge George A. Toole Jr. released Connor; last month
a Middlesex jury had acquitted Connor of charges relating to the Natick
robbery.

In 1997, Connor and a former associate, William Youngworth III, told
authorities they could broker the return of the stolen Gardner paintings if
they were provided full immunity from prosecution, and state charges facing
Youngworth were dropped.

They implicated two men in the theft: Robert Donati, a mob associate from
Medford who was the victim of a 1991 gangland slaying, and David Houghton, a
Malden auto mechanic who died the following year of a heart attack.

Hopes for a deal collapsed, however, when paint chips Youngworth provided
the FBI were shown not to come from one of the three stolen Rembrandts as
Youngworth contended, but probably from another painting done during that
period.

Brockton lawyer Martin K. Leppo, who represents Connor, said his client had
provided accurate information about the theft, but was unable to offer much
help after his memory loss.

Yesterday, Connor said that his memory has been coming back and that he
plans to undergo hypnosis again in an effort to remember more, with his eye
on the $5 million reward being offered by the Gardner Museum. 

http://www.boston.com/