[CPProt.net] Insider theft: Man sentenced to prison in art heist

[MSN CPPnet (Ton Cremers)]

Man sentenced to prison in art heist
November 10, 2005

Associated Press


ST. LOUIS - A former employee of a business that specialized in storing
valuables has been sentenced to two years in prison for conspiring to steal
millions of dollars worth of works by artists including Picasso and Matisse.

Donald R. Rasch, 44, of University City, apologized before sentence was
imposed Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Charles Shaw.

"I am very remorseful for the mistake I made, for all the victims involved,"
he said.

Rasch and another former employee of the now-defunct Fine Arts Express,
Biron A. Valier Jr., pleaded guilty earlier to a felony count of conspiracy
to transport stolen goods in interstate commerce.

They are accused of stealing paintings, prints and sculptures in June 2002 -
around the time the business was moving from St. Louis to suburban
Bridgeton. Prosecutors said the men claimed to own the art when they sold it
in 2003 and 2004.

The 133 pieces, valued at up to $4 million, belonged to David and Diane
Harter, who had kept them as an investment and had them in storage in
Missouri for nearly a decade while moving from Nebraska to Arizona and then
to Florida.

In addition to works by Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, their collection
included pieces by other artists including Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko
and Salvador Dali.

After one buyer became suspicious, stolen works were traced to other buyers
in New York, San Francisco, Tokyo and St. Louis. But 42 pieces remain
missing despite the efforts of law enforcement and the cooperation of the
two defendants.

At Tuesday's sentencing, the judge questioned attorneys about the missing
pieces.

"I'm kind of bothered by this," Shaw said.

"The government has done what it can, through investigation, to find out
where these pieces are," said Matthew Drake, an assistant U.S. attorney.

Rasch's lawyer, John Rogers, said his client had done all he could to locate
the art, and deescribed co-defendant Valier as "the guy running around
brokering deals with galleries."

Rasch entered his guilty plea to conspiracy to transport stolen goods in
interstate commerce on Aug. 25, Valier on Sept. 1. Valier's attorney,
William Margulis, said his client dealt with only one gallery and that all
the works he took had been returned by him or recovered by the FBI.

Ultimately, the judge made both defendants jointly liable to pay the victims
$1,194,410, the estimated value of the art work that is still missing.

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