The Art of the Heist

Fifteen

In the spring of 1974 Bobby Donati came to me with a proposal: he wanted me to help him rob the Woolworth family estate in Monmouth, Maine.

Because oriental rugs were Bobby’s area of expertise and because most rugs are housed in people’s homes rather than museums, much of Bobby’s attention was focused on private art collections. The New England elite were Bobby’s bread and butter, and he was careful to keep abreast of their comings and goings, familiarizing himself with their seasonal routines and their various vacation properties. In the same way an experienced bird watcher knows the migration habits of the cardinal or the chickadee, Bobby knew exactly which weekend the Boston Brahmins departed en masse for their vacation homes in Hyannis Port or Martha’s Vineyard, leaving their Beacon Hill mansions-and everything in them-untended.

Bobby had had his sights set on the Woolworth estate for some time. He wasn’t the only one. Just two years earlier, in the spring of 1972, thieves had robbed the place of nearly fifty paintings. Newspaper reports pegged the total value of the items taken at well over $250,000.

But as staggering as the theft was, the stolen pieces represented only a fraction of the art the family owned. Using their considerable fortune, the dry-goods heirs had amassed one of the best known collections of fine art in the country. Much of it was housed at the Monmouth estate.

“I don’t know,” I said when Bobby first approached me with his plan. “The place has got to be wired like Fort Knox by now.”

Bobby shook his head. “I’ve been up there. I’ve checked it out. There’s nothing.”

I was incredulous. “You’re telling me that after getting taken for a quarter of a million dollars they haven’t even installed an alarm?”

“Yup.” He smiled. Then, sensing I still didn’t believe him, he added, “I’ll take you up there and you can see for yourself.”

A few days later we drove to Maine together.

The estate, known at the time as Clearview Farm, was located some five miles outside of Monmouth, on a hillside overlooking Cobbosseecontee Lake. It was a sizeable property, a thousand acres of woods and pastures-and even a small orchard and cemetery-straddling the sparsely trafficked two-lane road that followed the lake’s western shore. A self-proclaimed “gentleman’s horse farm,” it was originally conceived as a retreat for the Woolworth brothers, Norman and Frederick, whose shared passion was horse racing. Norman had passed away a few years earlier and his widow, an avid art collector herself, now owned the estate, but Frederick still kept a home there. His house was to be our target.

Bobby, who had obviously done his homework, gave me a brief but thorough tutorial on the property as we drove the last few, winding miles to the estate, explaining that the only permanent resident was a caretaker who lived in a small cottage just down the hill from the main house. I could see why Bobby was so tempted by the prospect of robbing the place. In theory, at least, it seemed like the perfect setup.

“Here it is,” Bobby announced proudly as we came over a small rise and emerged from the woods.

The property, though grand, was less ostentatious than I had imagined. On one side of the road the land sloped gently toward the lake. On the other side a long gravel drive curved upward past a large, fenced pasture to the main house and massive horse barn.

Bobby slowed the car and pointed to a small cottage on the downhill side of the road. “That’s the caretaker’s place.”

“He’s got an awfully good view of the house,” I commented. In fact, the caretaker’s front windows looked directly across the horse pasture toward the main residence. It seemed highly unlikely to me that we could get in and out of the property undetected.

Bobby smiled and shook his head. “That’s Frederick’s place,” he said, pointing toward the thick woods on the far side of the pasture.

It was early enough in the season that the trees were not yet in leaf. Through the tangle of bare branches I caught sight of a large white structure.

“There’s a better view from the road up ahead,” Bobby explained as we continued along the road, leaving the pastures and the main house behind us, entering the woods once again. “There!” He pulled the car to the side of the road.

On the hillside above us, nestled among the trees, was a handsome cottage with a large, columned porch and distinctive double gambrel roofline.

“The mother lode!” Bobby declared.

That night we returned to the estate and, under the cover of darkness, hiked up to the cottage. Using flashlights, we were able to look in through the ground-floor windows at some of the artwork inside. What I was able to glimpse was impressive, to say the least. The walls were covered with paintings and prints. Even the furniture was museum-quality. I recognized, among other things, a Frederick Waugh seascape and a beautiful example of an eighteenth-century banjo clock. More impressive than the objects themselves was the fact that the Woolworths lived casually with such masterpieces. For a collector like me, the realization was staggering.

Our nighttime visit also confirmed what Bobby had told me earlier: that the house was not alarmed. In fact, there weren’t even adequate locks on the windows and doors. It would be ridiculously easy to jimmy our way inside. And the isolated location of the house meant we could literally drive a truck right up to the front door.

Bobby hadn’t been exaggerating: we had hit the mother lode.

With summer fast approaching, time was of the essence. Once June arrived, we both knew, the cottage would be host to a steady stream of visitors. If we didn’t pull off the job soon, we’d have to wait until fall.

Back in Boston, we set to work assembling an experienced crew. First on our list was Billy Irish. After much discussion, Bobby and I also agreed to include David Houghton. David had been begging for a bigger role in one of Bobby’s heists for some time, and we both figured the Woolworth estate would be a relatively safe way for him to indulge his craving for adventure.

Bobby had somehow gotten hold of a catalogue detailing the entire Woolworth collection. It was like a Sears catalogue of American art. Over the next few weeks we familiarized ourselves with the contents, taking note of the most valuable pieces in the lot, educating ourselves on what we should take and what we could afford to leave behind.

By the end of May we had made several more reconnaissance trips up to the estate and were ready to go. On the afternoon of May 25, driving Bobby’s car and a panel truck I had borrowed from Ralph Petrozziello, we headed for Maine.

On the night of the burglary the weather was perfect, warm and clear. The trees were in full leaf, hiding the house almost entirely from the road below, providing us with thick cover under which to perform our task. A bright crescent moon hung overhead, casting just enough light in which to see.

We arrived after midnight to find the estate reassuringly quiet. The windows in the caretaker’s house, as well as the main house, were dark. The cottage, at least what we could see of it from the road, appeared dark as well. We parked both vehicles at the bottom of the driveway, and Bobby climbed up alone to make sure the place was empty. About ten minutes later he reappeared, flashing us two thumbs up before climbing into his car.

I started the truck’s engine and followed him up to the cottage, parking just behind him on the gravel apron outside the front door. Moving quickly, the four of us assembled on the front porch, flashlights in hand. Using a pry bar he had brought along, Bobby tried to jimmy the front door, but cracking the lock was tougher than we had anticipated. Finally, he gave up, smashed a small glass panel near the handle, and reached inside. Within a matter of seconds the four of us were standing in the dark foyer.

It was time to get to work.

As planned, we fanned out through the house. With the exception of David Houghton, we were all old hands at breaking and entering. We worked quickly and quietly, methodically combing through the Woolworths’ staggering collection, looking for the pieces we’d already identified using Bobby’s catalogue. At the top of our list were three N. C. Wyeth paintings: the original oil painting for a cover illustration of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island; a portrait of a farmer holding a pig, titled “Pennsylvania Farmer”; and “Dark Harbor Fisherman,” a stunning oil painting of fishermen hauling in their glittering catch. Bobby was also particularly interested in two Andrew Wyeth watercolors. These five pieces alone, we knew, were worth upward of $200,000. The previous thieves had reportedly cut the paintings they took from their frames. I was well aware of the risk of damage involved in doing so, and made it clear to everyone how important it was to keep canvases and frames intact.

While we were trying to locate the Wyeths, I stumbled across not just one but two Simon Willard grandfather clocks that I had not known were part of the Woolworths’ collection. Willard, who produced timepieces in Massachusetts during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, was one of the finest craftsmen of his time. His clocks, examples of which still hang in the White House and the Supreme Court, are universally considered masterpieces.

I immediately went to tell Bobby. “You’ve got to see these clocks,” I said after finding him in a nearby sitting room.

Ignoring my request, Bobby gestured to the far wall, illuminating one of the Wyeth oils, “Dark Harbor Fisherman,” with the beam of his flashlight. “First, help me with this,” he said.

Together, we lifted the painting, which was a good four feet by five feet, from the wall and carried it through the dark house and out to the truck.

“Now what about these clocks?” Bobby asked as we walked back to the house.

“Not just clocks,” I said, peering into the woods below us, noting with relief that the main house and the caretaker’s house were both still dark. “Simon Willards. I’ll show you.”

Bobby followed me inside and down the main hallway to where one of the clocks was. “It’s awfully big,” he commented, shining his flashlight on the cabinet.

“These things are priceless,” I told him. “It’ll be well worth the effort. C’mon, give me a hand.”

Bobby shrugged. “If you say so.”

As we were loading the first clock into the truck, Billy and David appeared with several framed pieces, including the Andrew Wyeth watercolors. “I spotted a nice little pair of dueling pistols in the library,” Billy told me. “Something you might like.”

Thanking him for the information, I rushed back inside and made my way to the library. Billy was right: the pistols, made of silver and ornately carved bone, were just the kind of thing I liked. I took them as an addition to my collection.

Because of the isolated location and the relatively small risk of our being discovered, the Monmouth job was, without a doubt, the most leisurely heist I ever pulled. We were in the house for well over an hour. In that time we took nearly three dozen pieces, including both Simon Willard clocks, all three N. C. Wyeth paintings, and the two Andrew Wyeth watercolors. The total haul was worth nearly a quarter of a million dollars.

With everything finally loaded in the panel truck, Bobby and David set out for home, while Billy and I, driving the truck, cut through Vermont and New Hampshire, heading for Martha Ferrante’s house in western Massachusetts, where we planned to store our haul for the time being.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: there’s no way Martha couldn’t have known, or at least suspected, that the artwork was stolen; as smart as she was, it’s just not possible. But the honest-to-goodness truth is that, during this period of time, there was absolutely nothing remarkable about me showing up at her house with a truckload of art and antiques. As far as she knew, the things we carried up to her attic that day had been purchased legitimately at auction. This was what we told her, and she had no reason not to believe us.

As you might imagine, the biggest problem with a heist like the one we’d just pulled off was liquidating the merchandise. Putting the pieces on the block at Sotheby’s was not an option. In time we might be able to sell the lesser-known pieces at auction, but the real moneymakers-the Wyeth paintings-would immediately be recognized as stolen, even decades down the road.

Fortunately for us, there was-and still is-a thriving black market for fine art.

Contrary to what most people would like to believe, art and crime have always shared uncomfortably close quarters. A good deal of the art on display in many of the world’s finest museums has been acquired through unconventional means. Throughout much of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, classical antiquities were often illegally excavated and taken clandestinely from their countries of origin. Countless pieces of stolen Greek, Roman, and Egyptian art found their way into museums in the United States, Britain, and Europe with the full knowledge of museum staff. During World War II, artwork was routinely confiscated from Jewish owners by the Nazis. Many of these pieces later showed up in the collections of major European museums. As recently as 2008, dozens of museums in the United States, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, were found to have purchased looted Thai artifacts.

Often these thefts are justified by the museums themselves, who insist they are better equipped to care for the artifacts than more “primitive” facilities located in the countries from which the pieces have been taken. That, or they deny knowing the artifacts were stolen in the first place. Whether any of these things are true or not is a subject of intense debate. What is certain is that curators continually turn a blind eye to the questionable provenances of many of the pieces they purchase or are given.

In this case, even blind museums were out of the question. To find a buyer for the Wyeth paintings we would have to explore the unquestionably black corner of the trade, a domain inhabited mainly by private collectors.

For many people, mention of the black market in art brings to mind the infamous James Bond villain Dr. No, whose underwater lair was decorated with stolen masterpieces. While there are a small number of real-world collectors who fit this mold-extremely wealthy status seekers for whom exclusive possession of a great work of art is a high in itself-the motivations of the overwhelming majority of illicit collectors are less spiritual in nature. In the underground world of organized crime, stolen art acts as a kind of universal monetary unit. Easy to transport and readily converted into any currency, art is most often traded for weapons or drugs. The majority of these pieces never even leave their shipping crates, but are shuffled from one storage facility to another, like so many sacks of pirates’ gold.

Though not a member of any criminal organization himself, Bobby, like Ralph, had grown up on the fringes of that world and had many friends in the community. So when he told me he’d found a buyer for the Wyeths, I made certain assumptions.

“We can trust this guy, right?” I asked.

Bobby nodded. “Absolutely.”

On the morning of June 18 I rented a small U-Haul and drove up to Martha’s house in Northampton to retrieve the three N. C. Wyeth paintings and the two Andrew Wyeth watercolors. Things were moving quickly. Just the day before Bobby had called to say that the deal was a go. I was to meet the buyer that afternoon in Mashpee, a small tourist town on the western edge of Cape Cod.

Our rendezvous spot was the parking lot of a shopping center that housed On the Rocks, a local nightspot where my band and I were regular headliners. In fact, we had a gig there later that night. I figured I’d have just enough time to broker the deal for the paintings before the rest of my band arrived for the show.

Inland, the day was hot and humid, uncomfortable even. But by the time I reached the Mid-Cape Highway a pleasant breeze was blowing in off the bay. I cut southward across the Cape’s broad upper arm, skirting Otis Air Force Base, heading the last few miles into Mashpee. I was right on time.

I turned into the shopping center a few minutes ahead of schedule and pulled the U-Haul into a space at the far end of the parking lot. It was a Thursday, the weekend’s onslaught of tourists just beginning to arrive. The lot was nearly full, every other car a station wagon crammed with coolers and beach blankets. The shopping center’s little supermarket was doing a brisk early-season business in beer and charcoal.

No sooner had I cut the engine than two men emerged from a nearby van and started toward me.

“You’re Bobby’s friend, right?” one of them asked, approaching the U-Haul’s open driver’s side window.

Nodding, I popped the door and climbed out. “Myles,” I said, offering him my free hand.

His grip was limp, his palm clammy. “Johnny,” he told me, not bothering to introduce his associate.

I nodded, surveying the parking lot over his shoulder. It was impossible to tell whether or not we were really alone. But nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

“This way,” I said, heading toward the back of the truck, motioning for Johnny and his shadow to follow. I undid the lock and slid the door open, revealing the five carefully wrapped Wyeths inside. Then the three of us climbed up into the U-Haul together.

“You’ve got the cash?” I asked.

“Sure,” Johnny replied. “It’s in the van.”

I glanced over at him, catching the unmistakable timbre of a lie in his voice, the way he threw the words out there with all the assurance of someone bluffing an ace. I’d been set up.

Turning toward the open door, I saw a virtual army racing across the blacktop, pistols drawn.

“FBI!” the frontmost figure bellowed. “Get out of the van! Now!”

Every interaction I’ve had with the FBI has led me to believe that most federal agents rarely get the opportunity to leave their desks. As a consequence, when something big happens-the imminent arrest of one of New England’s more notorious criminals, for instance-every G-man within a hundred miles wants to be there for it. The Bureau is renowned among cons of all stripes for its overzealous use of manpower.

The Mashpee arrest was a perfect example of FBI overkill.

Despite the fact that my two “buyers” were clearly informants, leaving only one “real” criminal-me-for the feds to wrangle, there were at least two dozen agents on the scene. They swarmed on the truck, appearing seemingly from nowhere. As flattered as I was by all the attention, I found it unsettling to know I’d had twenty-odd sets of eyes watching my every move. They made a big show of cuffing all three of us, hustling Johnny and his shadow into the back of one unmarked car and me into another.

My companion for the ride to the nearby Barnstable County Jail was the lead agent on the case, a handsome, dark-haired Irishman named Bernie Murphy, with whom I would become extremely well acquainted over the course of the next eighteen months. Murphy was unabashedly elated to have collared me. I was his ticket to bigger and better things, just as I’d been for Deschamps and the other MDC cops back in Revere.

We didn’t say much to each other; I knew better than to answer any of Murphy’s questions. But as we neared our destination he leaned across the seat, bringing his face just a few inches from mine.

“I’ve got you now, Connor,” he said with a gloating smile. “Let’s see you get out of this one.”

For an instant I was back in that basement cell in Ellsworth, the deputy sheriff’s words still ringing in my ears. Oh no you don’t: the challenge that had sent me over the wall and into the Union River. Only this time there was nowhere to run.

The door opened and a pair of hands reached inside, pulling me to my feet. I wrestled myself free and ducked my head, meeting Murphy’s gaze once again. Now I was the one smiling.

“Just watch me,” I told him.