The FBI’s Most Wanted Stolen Items

Given today’s volatile stock market and sluggish global economy, more wealthy Americans are opting for alternative investment strategies, such as collecting high-profile art and jewelry. In turn, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation said theft of such items has become a booming criminal enterprise.

Clearly, there is high “black market” demand for the nation’s most valuable national treasures, as the FBI estimates total losses amount to $6 billion annually. The high school class ring of Elvis Presley, pictured here, is just one of many items the FBI is looking for.

In 1953, when Elvis Presley was in his senior year at Humes High School in Memphis, Tenn., his parents purchased the 10 karat gold ring for him. Stamped with his initial, “E,” it was worn by the singer during the early ‘50s and kept in his jewelry box as a memento of his childhood until given to bodyguard Dave Hebler.

Eventually, collector Chris Davidson acquired the ring, along with a letter of authenticity from Hebler, for his Elvis-A-Rama Museum in Las Vegas. In March 2004, thieves rammed a stolen tow truck into the back door of the museum and made off with an array of memorabilia, including the classic ring, the FBI said.

Thousands of items of cultural and historical significance have been reported stolen to the FBI, so it’s formed a special task force to recover the missing treasures. The Art Crime Team consists of 14 special agents, who are supported by three special trial attorneys for prosecutions. It maintains the National Stolen Art File, an online database that chronicles thousands of reported stolen items and is accessible to the public and law enforcement agencies alike.

This slideshow shows FBI’s most wanted stolen art works. Click ahead for the list.

“Ripping Off the Rich”premieres Monday, July 30 at 8 p.m. ET.

By Drew Sandholm
Posted 30 July 2012

It was a cold December day in 2002 when two thieves used a ladder to climb to the roof of the Vincent Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, the FBI reports. From the roof, the men broke into the museum and managed to steal two Van Gogh paintings in a matter of minutes, the FBI said. Van Gogh’s “View of the Sea at Scheveningen,” pictured here and “Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church in Nuenen” were both taken.

Dutch police convicted two men in connection with the crimes in December 2003, but the paintings — valued at $30 million — were not recovered, the FBI said.

In spring 2003, widespread looting of archaeological sites in Iraq led to major losses of priceless historical artifacts, according to the FBI. Thousands of artifacts were stolen from the Iraq National Museum, as well. Since then, a number of the stolen items have been recovered, but the FBI reports up to 10,000 items remain missing. Officials are still looking for around 5,000 cylinder seals, for example.

On July 25, 2006, Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced that the statue of King Entemena of Lagash, one of the most significant pieces looted from the Iraq Museum in 2003, had been recovered. The statue was returned to the Iraqi government at a ceremony in Washington.

Like something out of a movie script, two thieves disguised as Boston police officers entered the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum on the night of March 18, 1990 — after Boston’s St. Patrick’s Day festivities — and stole several notable works with an estimated total of $300 million, according to investigators.

The phony police officers told the guard on duty that they were responding to a call, so the guard let the thieves in through the museum’s security door, the museum said. Once inside, the thieves told the guard to step away from the security desk because there was a warrant out for his arrest, the museum said. Once the guard left his post, the museum said, he couldn’t reach the alarm button.

The thieves told the guard to have the other guard on duty come to the security desk. Once the burglars had both guards together, they were handcuffed and brought into basement, the museum said.The thieves secured the guards to pipes by duct taping their hands, feet, and heads, according to the museum.

With the guards tied up in the basement, the burglars were able to roam the museum and make off with 13 works of art. Rembrandt’s “The Storm on the Sea of Galilee,” pictured here, is just one of them. Others include Rembrandt’s “A Lady and Gentleman in Black” and “Self-Portrait,” as well as Johannes Vermeer’s “The Concert,” Govaert Flinck’s “Landscape with Obelisk” and Édouard Manet’s “Chez Tortoni.”

According to the FBI, two thieves entered the Oratory of San Lorenzo in Palermo, Italy, in October 1969 and removed the 1609 painting by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio from its frame. Experts estimate its value at $20 million, the FBI said.

A $3 million Stradivarius violin was reported stolen from the New York City apartment of violinist Erica Morini in October 1995, the FBI said. Made in 1727 by Antonio Stradivari, the violin is known as the Davidoff-Morini Stradivarius.

Fireworks lit the sky and brought the New Year in with a bang, as England celebrated the millennium on Dec. 31, 1999. As people partied, the FBI said, someone broke into the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and stole Paul Cezanne’s painting “View of Auvers-sur-Oise.” The FBI said the landscape painting, pictured here, is valued at roughly $4.5 million. On its website, the museum described the painting as an important work because it illustrates the transition from early to mature work by Cezanne.

Thieves cut these two oil paintings by American painter Maxfield Parrish from their frames at a gallery in West Hollywood, Calif., in July 2002, the FBI said.

The paintings — with an estimated total value of $4 million — are panels from a series commissioned for art collector Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney's Fifth Avenue mansion in New York, according to the FBI.

Works by Claude Monet, Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, and Salvador Dali were stolen from the Museu Chacara do Céu in Rio de Janeiro on Feb. 24, 2006, the FBI reports.

In broad daylight, four men entered the museum at gunpoint and left with these four renowned paintings: Monet’s “Marine,” Picasso’s “Dance,” Matisse’s “Luxembourg Garden,” and Dali’s “Two Balconies.” According to the FBI, there are no estimates of what the combined works are worth.

Dating to 1657-1659, Dutch master Frans Van Mieris painted this self-portrait known as “A Cavalier.” The oil on wood panel is relatively small, measuring 20-by-16 centimeters (8-by-6 inches), but it’s worth more than $1 million.

On June 10, 2007, the piece was stolen from the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney while the gallery was open for public viewing, the FBI said.