Attorney Nicholas O’Donnell rightly skewers the FBI’s recent media blitz on the so-called “confirmed sightings” of works stolen from the Gardner Museum:
If my skepticism sounds familiar, it is because there was a similar episode last year, when the FBI claimed “with a high degree of confidence” that it knew who had stolen the paintings. That story, as has often been the case, was released around the anniversary of the theft (though without mentioned that coincidence). Richard DesLauriers, the Special Agent in Charge in Boston, said then: “The FBI believes with a high degree of confidence that in the years after the theft, the art was transported to Connecticut and the Philadelphia region, and some of the art was taken to Philadelphia, where it was offered for sale by those responsible for the theft,”
The FBI theory seems to be this: an informant in a Dorchester garage accused Merlino of being involved, and someone else in the same garage knew Gentile, who had some police paraphernalia in his house. Really? Put that way, it is pretty clear why the FBI has not arrested anyone or offered more information: it cannot prove any of this.
The FBI said a year ago that it knew who was responsible, but clearly does not want to accuse Gentile directly. Instead, it is essentially asking the public to connect the fact that Gentile has some relation to Philadelphia, to the uncorroborated offers for sale in an “I’m just saying” sort of way.
The Gardner heist is a civic tragedy in here in Boston. It struck at one of our most treasured institutions. I can still picture the full-page headline in the Boston Globe the day that it happened (the Art Law Report was just a gleam in the eye of a local high school student then). But these recycled stories are not advancing the ball. If the FBI thinks it has a case against a responsible person, it should move on that information. If it is simply going to make insinuations, it should stop.
