Original subtitles

It started as one

of the most perfect art heists.

Two Rubens sketches stolen in broad daylight

from a gallery in Spain leaving no clues.

With the art world on high alert,

trying to sell the stolen paintings

was to prove the thief's biggest challenge.

Once the paintings came on the market,

the police, lawyers and art experts

came up with an elaborate plan

to get each painting back.

This is the story of how two Rubens sketches

were stolen and recovered

but who was the mastermind behind the theft?

(dramatic music)

(tranquil guitar music)

La Coruna is a small fishing town on the Atlantic coast

of northern Spain.

From these harbor walls in the 16th century,

the mighty Spanish Armada set sail to conquer England.

It ended in disaster.

The town attracted Spanish high society

who were patrons to the local gallery.

The Museum of Fine Art is home

to many priceless works of art,

among them Goyas, Velasquez and van Dycks.

The most valuable pieces in the collection

are two small sketches by the Flemish master Rubens.

Painted in 1636, they hang side by side.

(footsteps clattering)

La Coruna is a peaceful place.

September 16th, 1985 is a quiet day.

A man wearing a dark coat enters the Museum of Fine Art.

The museum has no high-tech security system

and only two security guards

to watch over the entire gallery.

(dramatic Spanish music)

The man in the black coat admires Rubens' work.

When the security guards are not looking,

he gets to work stealing the sketches.

Using an ordinary screwdriver,

he quickly pries the paintings out of their frames

and hides them in his coat pocket.

(Manuela speaking in foreign language)

The paintings had a very simple frame

so it was easy to take them out.

There was some damage,

not because it was difficult

but because they were old and fragile,

because they were from the 17th century.

The thief is able to walk out of the museum

before anybody notices the paintings are missing.

It could not have been simpler.

(Matias speaking in foreign language)

The robbery was very easy

because of the simplicity of the location.

It had no systems or ways of stopping them being stolen.

No clues were left at the scene

and the police had no leads.

The two Rubens sketches just disappeared.

(melancholic music)

Peter Paul Rubens was one of the greatest artists

of the 17th century

and the master of the baroque style.

Because of his fame,

the demand for Rubens' work was huge.

To keep up with this demand,

Rubens ran a studio employing every able painter in Antwerp.

Rubens, for each picture, would paint an autograph,

an authentic oil sketch,

sketch is perhaps a misleading word

because it was really a model,

close to what an architect does with his blueprints.

It was small but it gave all the lines,

the colors, the information

that his assistants would need

to render the full-sized picture.

So, it was a work of art in its own right

and even in Rubens' day was collected,

it was kept as a valuable picture on the wall.

(melancholic music)

Even today, the stolen sketches

have an estimated value of $1.5 million each.

Both of the stolen paintings depicted characters

from Greek mythology

and were preliminary sketches for a larger series

of paintings commissioned by the Spanish king, Philip IV.

They were small oak panel paintings called bazettos

measuring only 10 inches by six.

Daedalus and the Minotaur is based on Ovid's account

of the building of the labyrinth.

Daedalus, the architect hired by King Minos

is showing the Minotaur the labyrinth he has constructed.

The other painting, the Aurora,

features the Roman goddess of dawn sitting on a cloud.

She holds a crystal vase in her right hand

to collect the morning dew.

Both painting show Rubens at the height

of his expressive powers in the final stages of his life.

(Manuela speaking in foreign language)

These two paintings are very important

because you can see all of Rubens' skills

and all of his artistic ability.

You can see the way he is a master of the baroque style

and technique and his handling of light.

The paintings are very small but very important.

(dramatic music)

Nothing was heard about the paintings

for four months until 1,600 miles away

in Sweden's capital Stockholm a breakthrough came.

At the National Gallery, director of research,

Gorel Cavelli-Bjorkman was holding her weekly open house

where members of the public can bring works of art

along to be authenticated.

One of them arrived with what at first sight

seemed to be a fake Rubens painting.

Harold Leith came to me see me with the painting

because he knew that I was the expert

on Dutch and Flemish paintings.

And we unpacked it on the table

and looked at for some time together.

I saw it was really interesting

and he wanted to know if he owned a Rubens.

I thought it must be a copy.

It usually is.

I knew Rubens bazettos,

how loosely they were painted and very fresh

like a drawing in a way

and I said could I keep it?

When I have time, I want to go through this painting.

(suspenseful music)

Gorel was busy and needed more time

to study the painting in detail.

She had no inkling of its suspect provenance.

Time passed, days passed

and there wasn't really time

and then he suddenly phoned

and said the friend wants the painting back.

He only was the messenger for a friend.

Harold Leith wanted to come

and collect the painting that very afternoon.

Gorel had minutes to research the sketch.

She turned to the definitive work on Rubens

by Professor Julius Held.

I hurried to the library

and got Julius Held's book on Rubens' oil sketches.

And I flipped through the book

and I saw this particular painting,

so my first reaction was is this a copy

or is it the original?

I looked very thoroughly

and you can recognize a copy.

There is always some details that are different.

It's best with very good black and white photographs

where you can see the details very clearly

because then you can compare the lines

and the brush strokes and everything.

(dramatic music)

I could see that every line was the same.

When I thought it looks like the original,

it doesn't look like a copy

and so, I looked at the back of the book

where the catalog was

and saw that the painting belonged

to a small museum in Spain which I didn't know

this museum and this city even,

I didn't know,

so I phoned the Prado.

(Matias speaking in foreign language)

The chief of conservation

at the Stockholm Museum, Gorel,

phoned me and asked me as a specialist

in Flemish paintings if the paintings they had

were related to any Spanish paintings.

(suspenseful music)

Gorel's worst fears were confirmed.

The painting, Daedalus and the Minotaur

had been stolen from a gallery in La Coruna.

Time was running out

for Gorel to find a way to keep hold of the painting

before Harold Leith arrived.

I was agitated, shocked in a way

because what should I do?

He was coming very soon,

so I phoned our lawyer at the museum

and he said, you have to according to Swedish law,

you can't keep the painting.

(dramatic music)

Gorel knew that by giving it back

to Harold Leith, the masterpiece

might never be seen again.

So, I had to tell him

but he didn't want to be involved he said.

It's really not my friend.

(chuckling)

It's not a friend, it's just an acquaintance

of my wife's.

I just offered to do this

and I don't know this person very well.

(dramatic music)

So, we phoned the police.

(melancholic music)

With the whereabouts

of the Rubens sketch unknown,

Claus Trozig of Stockholm's police led the investigation.

He needed to know more about Harold Leith,

the man who had brought the painting

to the National Gallery.

You get a telegraph from Interpol in Stockholm.

That was the start of the investigation.

I only have this name Harold Leith

and he was not in our files.

I called him about the painting.

(phone ringing)

Leith, a local artist in Stockholm,

was brought in for questioning.

He told police he was simply helping

a friend authenticate a painting.

I don't think he realized that was the real one.

He told me that the friend of his

have given the painting to him.

Leith was able to give police

a vital lead, the phone number of his friend, Mol Miner.

(phone ringing)

I talked to Mol Miner

and that was the same day

and I get the name Ramon.

All the police knew about Ramon

was that he was Mol Miner's brother-in-law.

(phone ringing)

I called Ramon, told I want to speak to him

and he come to the police station.

We have a good speak

and he told me something about this painting

and he don't have the painting in his hand.

Ramon claimed he owned the painting

but he insisted that it was not an original Rubens.

He act like a businessman.

He was not nervous, poker face.

Ramon told police

he had taken the painting to a local gallery

and had asked them to sell it.

(dramatic music)

(lively music)

They sent the painting first to Sotheby's in London

who then passed it onto their New York office

for authenticator and auction.

Stockholm police were worried

that with the painting out of Swedish jurisdiction,

they had to act fast

to stop it slipping form their hands forever.

They contacted Sotheby's and were able to persuade them

to return the painting to Sweden.

Claus now had the stolen painting safely in custody.

He decided to bring Ramon in for questioning.

He discovered that he had two low-paying jobs,

as a chauffeur and a cleaner.

So I want to know how he get the painting and why.

Ramon came up with a bizarre explanation.

He claimed he was working with two South American students

who had the painting and wanted $30,000 for it.

He told me that this South American

was studying Leningrad to finance

the guerilla movement in South America.

I don't believe him but we have to check it out.

The police investigated the cleaning company

where Ramon said the students worked.

We can't find anything that say

that he is right or wrong.

Claus asked Ramon where he got the money

to buy the painting.

Once again, Ramon had the answers ready.

He have a loan from his brother

who have contact with the bank in Spain.

But when Claus contacted the bank,

they had never heard of Ramon.

There was something wrong about what he told me.

Claus had enough evidence

to apply for a search warrant from the state prosecutor.

It was my decision to look around in his apartment.

(dramatic music)

(sirens ringing)

Police raided Ramon's apartment

in Stockholm looking for evidence.

They were also searching for the second Rubens painting

stolen from La Coruna, the Aurora.

(suspenseful music)

The Aurora sketch was not found in his home.

But the police did have one lucky break,

they found Ramon's passport

and it was provided a vital clue.

We find his Swedish passport

and we check up the stamps

and find that he was in Spain

at the time of the theft.

(dramatic music)

The passport proved that Ramon was in La Coruna

at the time of the theft

but the police still had no evidence

to prove he stole the painting.

Claus Trozig and me, we instinctively knew

this is the thief in La Coruna. (chuckles)

I was catching him seven times.

The police discovered details

of Ramon's background and his childhood in Spain.

As a child he was living in La Coruna.

The painting was stolen from a museum in Spain

about five minutes' walk from his home.

We could find on a map

that his school and the museum

was on one line from his home.

Probably pass the way when he go to school.

He has passed that museum many, many times

as a child.

(meditative Spanish music)

The evidence was circumstantial.

Hans couldn't prove he stole the painting

but he could charge Ramon with handling stolen goods.

Not the thief but handling stolen goods.

It's second best.

(dramatic music)

Hans took the case to the District Court

in Stockholm on January 12th, 1987

where Ramon was charged with being in possession

of a stolen Rubens painting

but Ramon pleaded not guilty

claiming the painting was not the original but a copy.

He made a very nice impression.

I could have met normally as a friend

in a party or something

drinking wine and talking about picture

because he was so nice and so decent and civilized.

In court, Hans confronted Ramon

about the inconsistencies in his story.

The passport stamps, the elusive students

who said he sold him the painting

and the question of how he could afford

to buy the painting working as a cleaner and chauffeur.

I couldn't in court get him upset.

He behaved himself,

he was never, never upset.

Never, never.

Whatever he said, it's not right, it's a lie.

But however cool Ramon remained,

the court did not believe his story

and he was convicted of handling the stolen painting.

As a prosecutor, you don't look too much

in their faces but I noticed in the eye,

he is just cold and...

But if Hans thought that was the end

of the story, he was wrong.

(dramatic music)

Ramon appealed his conviction at the District Court

and his lawyer came up with an ingenious defense.

Ramon may only have been a chauffeur and cleaner

but he was able to hire the best

and most expensive lawyer in Sweden.

He claimed the painting could not possibly

be the same Rubens that was stolen in Spain.

It was five millimeters smaller.

He made a very, very good job

trying to prove that it wasn't the original Rubens.

They talk about small difference.

Five millimeters smaller.

He's the best lawyer, so we lost the case.

(dramatic music)

(melancholic music)

Ramon had managed to convince

the Appeals Court that his Rubens was a fake.

The police and prosecution were horrified.

We were afraid that we should come

to a point when we had to give it back to him.

We all felt that this is not right.

Afterwards when I heard that,

I said it's foolish

because panel paintings change size

when they are in a dry and in a moist environment.

Wood shrinks and expands

according to the air humidity

if you have an old cupboard,

you can hear how it cracks sometimes

when it's very dry out

or somebody made a mistake

when they proofread the catalog

or somebody could measure wrongly of course.

But half a centimeter, I notice that

in own inventories

and if I measure it again,

we make it more thoroughly perhaps now.

(dramatic music)

(suspenseful music)

Hans was convinced that Ramon was guilty

and decided to take the case to the highest court

in the land, the Swedish Supreme Court.

I was desperate

because I was so convinced

that it was the original

just because of shrinking oak.

But how to prove it.

Then Gorel came up with a dramatic way

of proving the painting was the genuine stolen Rubens.

(dramatic music) (camera snapping)

I could take a transparency photo of the painting

and another photo from the book.

And they called me as a witness,

so I was asked to come up to the judges.

(dramatic music)

I could slide this transparency over the other photo.

Every line went into the right place.

And so, it was closed.

(inspirational music)

It was perfectly fixed.

She could show that it was the original.

Finally the prosecution had got their man.

Ramon was convicted and sentenced

to two years in prison.

I felt good, I felt justice as well.

I was just a bit angry

that I couldn't prove that he was the thief in La Coruna.

But bizarrely under Swedish law,

if you have no previous convictions,

you are allowed six months to put your affairs in order

before beginning your sentence.

Ramon didn't waste the opportunity,

he simply got on a plane and disappeared.

(airplane engine roaring)

We heard he was going to Spain

and to Japan and then to South America

and we haven't heard anything about him since then.

(inspirational dramatic music)

Daedalus and the Minotaur and was returned

to the gallery in La Coruna

but where on Earth was the other Rubens masterpiece,

the Aurora and where was the mysterious Ramon?

It would be another six years

before anyone got a clue to the whereabouts

of the second missing Rubens.

(upbeat music)

It came on the other side of the Atlantic

in Miami, Florida and from an unexpected source.

U.S. Customs normally used to catching drug dealers

received some undercover information.

I received a call from a source of information,

he knew this female in Miami

who had stolen and smuggled a Rubens painting.

Keyword was smuggled and we worked smuggling cases,

so we knew that we had something

that was potentially worthy of investigation.

When David met his source,

he learned that the seller

was a woman called Orli Beigel.

He said it was a Rubens sketch painted

on a thin wood panel.

It really meant nothing to me at all.

I wasn't familiar with Rubens,

I wasn't familiar with his works at all.

This was the first and only case of this type

that I've worked.

It was brand new to me.

David put a team together

to help with the investigation.

He needed someone to go undercover.

I asked an agent in our group, Hank,

if he would meet with the individuals

in an undercover capacity

and represent a buyer.

He was the oldest agent in the group

and he had a pretty extensive undercover experience

in narcotics cases and other customs-type cases

and he looked the least likely to be suspected

of being a law enforcement officer.

(phone ringing)

We had the source contact Orli by phone

and he told her he had someone

who might be interested and would like to see the painting,

so he asked if she could produce it.

(upbeat music)

Hank needed to meet with Orli

and see exactly what she had for sale.

The meeting took place in the lobby of a hotel

in Miami Beach.

Orli suggested that location, she felt comfortable there.

(dramatic music)

At the meeting, two Latin males arrived with a briefcase.

And that was the first time we knew of anybody else

besides Orli being involved.

The painting was produced from the briefcase.

They had the painting that they wanted to sell.

Hank was playing the role as the buyer's representative.

He didn't do a lot of talking at the meeting.

The source did most of the talking.

Hank just looked at the painting.

Made a couple of mental notes.

He didn't know what he was looking for.

The meeting had been a success for both sides.

Orli thought she had found a buyer

while Hank had seen the painting he thought

was called The Dawn.

Hank came back and he had an interesting way

of communicating, just the way he said it

was pretty funny at the time.

Told us it's a painting on a thin piece of wood

and it's a fat lady sitting on a cloud

holding a lamp in her hand.

(upbeat music)

It was in a subsequent telephone call

where they started to talk about the price.

Orli stated they want $3.5 million for the painting.

She wanted to be paid in cash.

He said that was fine.

Of course he knew we weren't having to pay

or anything anyway.

At this stage, all David knew about the sketch

was it was painted by Rubens

and was very expensive.

Initially we started doing research

to see if we could identify any Rubens works.

An agent in our office, Zack Mann,

went to the University of Miami Library.

We wanted to look at any artwork

that we could compare to the description.

All Zack had to go on was Hank's description

and the name, The Dawn.

So, I was looking through the books.

Zack located a picture of the painting

in one of those books.

The picture was a perfect match

for what Hank had seen at the meeting.

The problem was it had the wrong name,

it was called the Aurora.

(upbeat music)

When Zack showed Hank the book,

he immediately recognized it.

They then decided to contact the author,

Professor Julius Held.

We had a photograph from one of Dr. Held'sooks.

I had spoken to Professor Julius Held.

Dr. Held was the world's leading expert

on Rubens but was too old to travel to Miami.

He suggested contacting his protege,

Charles Scribner in New York.

I had spoken to Dr. Charles Scribner,

another Rubens expert.

(phone ringing)

I got a telephone call at my office,

the voice at the other end of the line

said this is Special Agent David D'Amato

from U.S. Customs, my immediate response

was "Oh, my God, what have I smuggled,

"what am I in trouble for?"

Then, he went on to explain

that he'd been given my name by Professor Julius Held

who was the world's leading Rubens and Rembrandt expert.

Dr. Scribner lived in New York

and had worked for Professor Held.

He knew precisely the sketch

that U.S. Customs were interested in.

Hank's description of the Aurora

as a fat lady sitting on a cloud

holding a glass is a fair description,

if somewhat cruel.

I mean she's only fat by comparison

to Audrey Hepburn and current day actresses.

In Rubens' day she would have been considered

an ideal woman.

You dare not call a woman today Rubensian

or you'll have your face slapped.

But she's a beautiful woman sitting

on a cloud because dawn comes with clouds.

The crystal vase that she holds in her hand

holds dew which is what dawn brings

and in paintings of dawn at work, so to speak,

you see her scattering the dew.

It became clear that Dawn and Aurora

were the same painting.

I realized we had something potentially of value.

But was it genuine or a fake.

If the painting turned out to be a fake,

it would be worthless

and the police couldn't arrest Orli Beigel.

And they wanted a Rubens expert to come down.

We knew we had to get the painting authenticated.

We wanna make sure that it is in fact the art

that is stolen, that it's legitimate,

that it's real, you don't wanna

necessarily pursue someone

who's painting sketches in his garages

and calling them Van Gogh or something like that.

They wanted me to come down on Saturday.

I knew that I had two very young children

and I knew my wife would be furious

if I took off and said I'm going to Miami Beach

on Saturday and left her with the children,

so I explained to them that I could not come down Saturday.

Could they wait 'til Monday

and they were very uneasy about that

because it meant keeping the criminals on the tenterhook

over the weekend and they might suspect something.

already Customs feared that Orli Beigel

might be backing out of the deal.

Where she really started to get cold feet

was in subsequent telephone conversations.

She contacted the source between meetings

and she said it seemed like it was going

a little too easy.

She even asked the source

how well he knew Hank

and whether or not he knew Hank

was a law enforcement officer.

And the source assured her that he was not

and that she could proceed, everything was fine.

(upbeat music)

With Orli beginning to have second thoughts

about the deal, Hank moved quickly

to set up a second meeting.

We had told Orli that we would have an expert

on that day but it was a bluff.

I'd spoken to Professor Julius Held

and I had spoken to Dr. Charles Scribner,

so we had the experts giving us characteristics

to look for.

We were told to look for a crack

about a centimeter in

from the left side running straight down from top to bottom,

also the stylus pinpricks

we were told ran along that crack.

The catalog reference number

was in the lower right-hand corner

and it was painted on in a white paint.

We were told to look for certain blemishes

like these blemishes down here.

This dark spot here.

This scratch right here

and we could also see all these things

in the photograph that we had by the time

of the original painting.

Hank went into the second meeting.

He was wearing a wire.

He also had a camera hidden in a briefcase.

(dramatic music)

We had agents around,

so we were monitoring the whole thing from outside.

(suspenseful music)

This time, Hank was looking

for specific marks Charles told him

would only be on the original.

Hank noted a crack down the left side,

stylus pinpricks and certain blemishes.

The only thing missing was the catalog reference number.

So, he asked one of the Latin males

who had brought the painting

if there was any way he could contact the owner

to ascertain what had happened to that number

or anything about the number

and so, the younger Latin male stepped away

and made a phone call

and came back in the room,

said he had spoken to the owner

and that the owner told him he had removed

that reference number

because he didn't want the painting traced.

The younger Latino male

told Orli the number which had been removed

from the corner of the painting was 284.

It should have been 285.

However, 284 was the catalog number

for Daedalus and the Minotaur

so it seemed they had a real Rubens

and it linked the two paintings together.

(dramatic music)

We had a real Rubens

and it was this painting taken in 1985

along with a second Rubens painting.

After the meeting, I recontacted Dr. Scribner

and then he agreed to fly down on Monday morning.

I was terribly excited.

I thought it sounded like the greatest adventure

of my life, an armed sting operation

with federal undercover agents, I loved the idea of it.

And I think Dave kind of talked him into coming down

and tell him that he would have the opportunity

of a lifetime.

This was gonna be real Miami Vice for Charles Scribner.

I was two weeks away

from my 40th birthday and I thought what a glorious way

to go out before hitting 40 at age 39

in an undercover operation with federal agents

in Miami Beach over Rubens

which was my specialty.

Charles Scribner took the first flight

from New York to Miami.

Agent Mann picked him up at the airport

and brought him to the briefing.

He seemed quite excited, excited and nervous.

They were so organized

and they had this conference room set up

and they had Professor Held's book

that I had worked on.

This is amazing.

They had all their notes and they were assigning jobs

and I thought this is amazing,

it's like being back at university.

We have briefings, they're very detailed,

there's a lot of issues that need to be discussed

such as surveillance teams, security,

everything down to where's the closest hospital

in case something were to go wrong.

Initially I thought as this as an acting assignment.

When I was a school boy,

I originally wanted to be an actor.

Whenever we do any kind of an arrest,

a take-down operation like that,

agents are armed.

We wear bulletproof vests.

He was talking about everybody

would be wearing a bulletproof vest

and I then innocently asked

well, do I get a vest too?

Thinking what a stupid question, of course I got a vest

and they looked at me and they said oh no, no,

you can't wear a vest.

We told him no, it would be a little bulky,

it wouldn't look right

and we couldn't do that.

It was at that poin I realized whoa,

this isn't just an acting assignment, this is serious,

this is for real.

That might have been a reality moment for him

saying that it's not television,

it's not Miami Vice on TV,

this is real law enforcement.

And then somebody in the meeting

had mentioned earlier operation

where something had gone askew

and somebody had been shot

and I thought uh-oh, this is not only serious,

it's dangerous and so, that got my adrenaline pumping

but that's probably a good thing.

I asked him to go into the meeting

and to look at the painting

and basically just to tell Hank,

the undercover agent

whether or not it was authentic.

Dave asked him to really not say a whole lot,

just kind of confirm that it was in fact

a true Rubens.

Just to nod, or give a signal that it was real

or even to go on the side

and talk to him for a minute

but not to get involved in any kind of negotiations

or any conversation with the subjects.

I thought this is a rather,

this is like a walk-on, a spear carrier in Aida,

I didn't fly all the way down to Miami Beach

to look at a painting

and just nod my head or shake my head.

I thought I may have to ad lib.

(dramatic music)

The sting operation swung into action.

Armed police took up their places

around the hotel

while Charles Scribner, Hank

and the source made their way to the lobby.

The lobby was a scene out of some movie.

It was very art deco,

it was kind of low budget art deco.

So, we sat down at a nice table

with a picture window overlooking the beach

and there was a swimming in the background

and one solitary sunbather, a young woman,

taking in the mid-morning rays of the sun

and it was all a scene out of a movie.

It had everything in it but Richard Gere.

And I remember there was a jukebox playing.

And I said to Orli, I said this hotel

could be right out of a Scott Fitzgerald novel

if it weren't for the jukebox.

And my part was to be part of the surveillance team

outside with other agents watching

and listening to everything that was going on

at the time.

Hank noticed that a forth individual was present

who was a surprise to him,

he had not seen him at the previous meetings.

And Orli told Hank that this fourth individual was going

to provide security for her

and to accompany Hank to the bank.

When you hear security, you usually think

of weapons and so, we thought it was possible

he might be armed.

(dramatic music)

Then came the moment Charles Scribner

had been waiting for.

Agent Hank really took charge

and Orli delivered to Agent Hank a manila envelope.

And that was it

and so, he gave it to me

and I was astonished.

I said this is the picture,

it was in the kind of envelope

you'd get some legal documents,

there was no padding, there was no careful wrapping,

it was just in a regular legal envelope

and I pulled it out

and it was wrapped in this sort of red,

slightly greasy cloth

and I removed the cloth

and there in its full glory was Aurora.

(dramatic music)

On this lovely little panel, piece of wood

in oils and the second I saw it,

I knew it was an original Rubens

but I was so outraged and surprised

that they would have been so casual

about the handling of this picture

that I immediately remonstrated with them

and scolded them

and said this is no way to wrap a Rubens.

I said next time be sure you have it wrapped up

in bubble paper and preferably leave a frame on it.

I'm sitting there thinking, oh my gosh,

this was not part of the plan.

They all were kind of nodding

and smiling sheepishly.

And there's always the chance

that something can be said

that doesn't make sense to the people

who have the painting.

I hadn't taught a class on Rubens since 1976,

it had been 15 years earlier

and now I was back in the classroom

and I think my students couldn't leave,

so I thought I'm gonna make the most of this,

so I started discussing the picture

and how it was painted

and what the subject was and was it dawn,

was it Aurora or was it Psyche, the goddess of the soul,

there personification of the soul?

There's always the possibility of armed security

in any type of deal.

You're talking millions of dollars

and you're dealing with bad guys

who think they're dealing with bad guys

and so, that's always a concern.

I think it was about this time

that I felt even more relaxed now

back in the classroom, so to speak

and I thought I'd have a little fun

with the crooks

and so, Orli was clearly their spokesman.

So, I looked at her

and I said, tell me,

this is the most beautiful Rubens oil sketch

I have ever seen outside of a museum

knowing full well that it had come from a museum.

Where did you get it?

(dramatic music)

There was this pause, silence,

Agent Hank, I thought was at this point

was about to have a coronary.

And she didn't miss a beat.

She looked at me and smiled

and she said inheritance

and I thought that is the classiest,

most clever answer.

I could not have dreamed it up in her position.

I thought this is one smooth woman.

(dramatic music)

I'm sitting there just thinking gosh,

it's not what we planned

and hopefully he'll cut his lecture short here.

Agent Hank had asked me

whether I thought it was original.

I said yes.

Are you absolutely sure and I said yes, absolutely sure

and he said, on a scale of one to 10,

what you would say?

And I said on a scale of one to 10,

I would say it's an 11.

And then he asked again

and I thought this is getting a little redundant.

He said just how positive how are

and I thought I've got to close this line

of questioning, I said that I had two sons

back home in New York

and I often wondered where they came from

but I had no doubt where this picture came from

and everybody kind of chuckled

and that was the end of that line of questioning.

I was with other agents outside the hotel

waiting for a signal

to go in to make arrests.

That signal would be Dr. Scribner leaving the hotel,

walking out to the street.

I was just kind of crossing my fingers hoping everything

went as we thought it would.

Agent Hank said the next stop

was they were gonna go to the bank

and he was gonna get the money

and pay for the picture and my role was over.

One of the group of four was clearly the bodyguard

and I assumed was the gunman.

He exchanged some expression with the informant.

This fourth individual seemed to be pretty street smart

and he decided it was time to leave.

He had a feeling something was gonna be coming down.

Charles Scribner got up and left.

He came up to me and he said I'm going with them.

At that point I thought oh my God,

they must sense that something is suspicious

and they're sending him to hold me hostage.

By the time we got to the hotel lobby entrance,

he had vanished.

(dramatic music)

When Charles walked out of the hotel,

he said Dave, he's cleared the hotel.

It's a go. - They're out.

And I gave the signal to move in.

And the next moment, armed agents went into the hotel.

In my mind everything was fine.

You have agents coming in from all directions,

the different access points to the lobby

and you secure the lobby

and you arrest the individuals.

(dramatic music)

Hank informed us immediately

that a fourth individual had been present,

he described him physically to us.

So, myself and another agent began to look for him.

We started the search of the area.

Hank didn't see where he went

but he knew that he was somewhere still in the building.

We actually found him in a laundry room

and there was a bathroom off to the corner

and the doors wide open and as we went into the room,

I just noticed a slight movement

between the door and the door jam

and that indicated to me

that someone was behind that door

and would identify themselves

in no uncertain terms

and pulled him out and placed him under arrest.

(dramatic music)

The sting had worked.

The entire gang had been arrested

and the stolen Rubens recovered.

(lively music)

I felt good about it.

We had accomplished what we wanted

and the main thing was nobody got hurt.

We had four subjects in custody

and everybody did their part

and it was a good feeling.

The suspects were arrested, the painting was recovered

and nobody was injured.

It was really picture perfect.

It was just the way a take-down should take place.

(lively music)

I was now out on the street.

There was a lot of commotion,

all the armed U.S. Customs agents had come in

with their guns pulled

and they had arrested the people inside.

He thought it was quite exciting

that to have participated in an undercover meeting

that was very successful.

And the best part of it was the end

when I got to my plane

and they were closing the door

and I had a government-issued ticket

and I said the government wants me back

in New York immediately

and she looked at the ticket

and she said okay, you can get on the plane,

so I got on an earlier flight

and I thought that was the perfect ending to this adventure.

(lively music)

Immediately after the arrests,

myself and Hank brought Orli into an office.

Orli fell apart when we went in.

She was reduced to tears immediately,

very shaken up by the whole experience, very scared.

I took her handcuffs off her,

I wanted to make her feel a little more relaxed

and she told us the whole story from start to finish.

Orli Beigel said the painting

had been brought up from Nicaragua.

She was merely brokering a deal

for the Alvarez brothers

who are acting for the mysterious owner of the painting.

We asked Orli how they came up with the price

of 3.5 million

and she said that the owner had wanted one million dollars

for the painting

and that anything that they could make over that

would be split four ways

between the four people involved here in Miami,

so they got greedy and they asked 3.5 million.

But what was the identity of the owner?

The name turned out to be familiar.

After the arrests when we went back to the office,

the younger Alvarez agreed to talk with us.

And he told us that he had brought the painting up

in the briefcase, the same briefcase we saw

at the meeting

and he said he was doing it for this individual

in Nicaragua, Ramon.

(dramatic music)

The police set up a trap

to implicate Ramon.

(suspenseful music)

When I heard the name Ramon mentioned,

I assumed it was the same Ramon.

We asked him to ask Ramon

what the lowest amount of money he would accept

for the painting would be

and Ramon replied one million.

(dramatic music)

As far as I know, Ramon is still an Interpol fugitive,

international fugitive from the case in Sweden.

(meditative music)

Both paintings were reunited

side by side to great public relief in Spain

but questions were asked about security

to ensure this could never happen again.

(Manuela speaking in foreign language)

The public reaction was remarkable.

People were now aware of how important the paintings were.

And all this contributed

to the building of the new museum.

On December 12th, 1995,

the paintings moved to a brand new home in La Coruna

with the latest security systems.

They now have a place of pride in the gallery

but Ramon, the man who stole the paintings

is still at liberty.

(dramatic jazz music)