Meet the Man Who Stole $1.4 Billion With a Screwdriver

this video is kindly sponsored by keeps find out more later on hey 42 here in may of 1997 in a museum in lucerne switzerland a security guard notices something alarming one of the museum's paintings is missing from its regular slot on the wall this is a small museum with only a handful of guests visiting each day and the security guard has just seen two of them a man and a woman walk briskly out of the front door the guard sprints outside and catches sight of the couple getting into a car and sure enough the museum's missing painting is sitting on the back seat as luck would have it the museum happens to be situated opposite a police station and soon enough the thieves are in custody but at the subsequent trial it's clear the man is extremely remorseful it was he who took the painting a spur of the moment decision he deeply regrets since the man's criminal record is clean he's released with a suspended sentence serving no jail time nobody knew it at the time but the swiss authorities had just let the greatest art thief in history slip through their fingers this is the remarkable story of stefan brightweiser a frenchman who stole almost one and a half billion dollars worth of art to put that number into perspective if you were to don your best cat burglars outfit right now and nick the three most expensive paintings ever sold at auction leonardo da vinci's salvador monday 450 million dollars wilhelm de kooning's interchange 300 million dollars and suzanne's the card players 250 million dollars you would still need to pilfer another half a billion dollars worth of art to surpass stefan breitweiser's record the sheer volume of arts to fan stole is genuinely almost unbelievable but perhaps even more unbelievable is what he did with it all after he'd stolen it but i'm getting ahead of myself for now it's probably best if i start at the beginning and like all good stories this one starts with cheese sort of i want to take a moment to talk about hair loss because i've had 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you'll see results and the sooner you start using keeps the more hair you'll save if you're noticing that you're losing your hair do something about it for a limited time go to keeps.com forward slash 42 or click the link in the description to receive 50 percent off your first order in march 1995 stefan brightweiser was visiting griez the swiss town that gave its name to a kind of cheese you've almost certainly enjoyed if you've ever tucked into a traditional swiss fondue but stefan wasn't in town for molten dairy products along with his new girlfriend and catherine kleinklaus stefan had his heart set on seeing gruyere's medieval castle specifically its collection of exquisite art as the couple strolled through the ancient corridors one piece in particular caught stefan's eye a portrait by german painter christiane wilhelm dietrich staring at the painting stefan experienced one of those weird urges that we all have from time to time a brief and intense desire to do something we really shouldn't something like jumping off a bridge chipping up a passing pensioner or stealing a painting by the way don't feel bad if you occasionally fancy downing and oap these kinds of inappropriate urges are so common they actually have a name kakawi fees for most people kakawi fees last a couple of milliseconds but stefan's lingered so much so that he mentioned it to that new girlfriend of his now i'd suggest that admitting you're tempted to commit a serious felony to your new tinder date is usually a good way to earn yourself the in-person equivalent of a swipe left but to stephan's surprise his new girlfriend was all for it as far as art heists go this one wasn't the most dramatic the castle was basically deserted apparently all the tourists were off eating fondue and all stefan had to do was remove the painting from its frame slip the canvas into his rucksack and walk out the front door anticlimactic it might have been but an international art crime career the likes of which the world had never before seen had just begun because over the course of the following six years stefan completed a grand total of 239 successful art heists at 172 galleries in at least seven different countries so how on earth did he do it i mean art thievery isn't typically regarded as a steady long-term career choice sooner or later you're either going to get caught or make so much cash that you can retire to your own private island in micronesia if you're picturing grand heists with oceans 11 style planning and huge teams of specialists you're dead wrong there were no carefully or orchestrated distractions no detailed museum schematics and no jaunts through conveniently positioned air vents in fact these heists weren't even committed at night they took place during opening hours and often with tourists and security guards in the very same room you see stefan had noticed that the big galleries the louvres and the momas of this world have the kind of high-tech security systems that make fort knox look like a drafty hen house small galleries on the other hand come with all the security of a chunk of swiss cheese most rely on the general trustworthiness of their visitors combined with an assumption incorrect in most cases that every painting and sculpture is bolted down and rigged up to an alarm in short outside of the famous few great works of art are sometimes frighteningly easy to steal not trying to give you any ideas of course every one of stefan's heist was a little different but all were almost laughably basic pretty much involving waiting till nobody was looking and then simply picking up whatever he fancied and walking out the front door paintings would be slipped from frames and hidden under a loose fitting coat and display cases were opened with a screwdriver one twist at a time over the space of 20 minutes or so the most high-tech piece of equipment stefan owned was an old telescopic radio antenna which he used to prod any inconveniently placed cctv cameras into facing away from whatever it was he was about to steal it's hard to believe that's all it took for stefan to pilfer close to a billion and a half dollars worth of loot but these basic tricks were so effective he was often able to steal from the same museum multiple times in the space of just a few weeks using rudimentary disguises to ensure staff at the museum didn't recognize him it probably helps that god saw fit to bestow stefan brightweezer with one of the all-time great pair of balls he was almost inhumanly cool under pressure remaining calm even on the few occasions he almost got caught i should point out that estimates as to the exact value of the artwork stefan stoll vary but the figure most commonly quoted is the one i mentioned earlier 1.4 billion dollars according to the new york times it might have been as much as 1.9 billion and if that upper limit is correct as of 2001 when this remarkable crime spree came to an abrupt end stephan brightweiser art thief would have been amongst the top 250 richest people on the planet not that you'd have known it from looking at him in fact to the outside world stefan and ann catherine now his long-term girlfriend appeared to be stone cold broke stefan worked sporadically as a waiter and general kitchen dog's body whilst anne catherine was a nurse money was so short that stefan's mother often helped the couple out with food and petrol money was this apparent poverty some kind of front then a gus from breaking bad style cover story to hide their immense wealth from the outside world actually no stefan and ann catherine appeared close to destitute because that's exactly what they were despite having stolen well over a billion dollars worth of fine art the pair hardly had two cents to rub together and not because they'd blown their riches on boats and hoes either and here we come to what may just be the most remarkable part of this whole mad story because despite having taken enormous risks to steal hundreds of treasures of almost unimaginable value stefan bradweezer never sold a single one of them not one and the reason why is kind of hilarious stefan didn't become the world's greatest art thief to get rich quick he did so because he loved art instead of selling the pieces he stole he kept them in the apartment he shared with anne catherine simply to have the pleasure of owning and admiring them incidentally the apartment in question was in the atticus to fan's mother's house in the city of mullhouse france the couple were so poor they couldn't afford to rent and yet hanging on their shabby walls strewn across side tables and piled up in corners was over a billion dollars worth of fine art a collection that would have put many of the world's galleries to shame stefan was a remarkably successful thief but it was this unique desire to own the pieces he stole rather than sell them that allowed him to operate for so long you see plenty of art thieves are able to successfully escape the scenes of their crimes with their swag intact but selling a world famous piece of art is a seriously tricky business you can't just set up an ebay listing and watch the million pound bids roll in the market for this kind of thing is tiny and in order to access that you're probably going to need to make friends with some very dangerous people to help you get the word out but getting the word out about your recent highly illegal art theft is arguably riskier than the stealing part was in the first place which is why it's at this stage of the process the sale that many art thieves are ultimately caught and brought to justice since the fan never put a single piece of art up for sale he remained essentially invisible to the police if they didn't catch him in the act of stealing they weren't going to catch him at all the particulars of stefan's crime spree were so unusual that the police had basically no idea who or what they were dealing with i mean look at it from their perspective an incredible volume of art was being lifted from museums all across europe the robberies always happened in daylight and yet the thieves were never caught not to mention the fact that there was complete radio silence from the black market and none of those pieces taken were ever seen again their best guess was that some kind of highly professional international cartel was behind the crimes but in reality they were utterly stumped if stefan had been content with a more modest collection you know just a billion dollars worth or something like that he might never have been caught but it was his own insatiable appetite that eventually brought about his downfall stefan simply couldn't stop and it was only a matter of time before something went wrong the item that eventually ended his reign of art based terror was of all things a bugle at the start of this video i mentioned that stefan had been caught stealing a painting in lucerne back in 1997. he'd gotten away with little more than a slap on the wrist at the time but during the process of being booked he'd had his fingerprints taken from that moment on he'd been careful to wear gloves during his thefts to ensure he never left behind any prints that could be matched to his earlier arrest but while stealing the bugle stefan had forgotten to don the latex gloves he'd brought with him if the police happened to dust the bugle's display cabinet for prince the game would be up oh and by the way just to make things even spicier this bugle happened to be located in the richard wagner museum in of all places lucerne the very same city he'd been caught the first time i told you this man had balls of legend two days later stefan went back to the museum to try and cover his tracks the bugle job had been one of his rare solo missions so it was decided that anne catherine should be the one to erase the prince but this was a risky job and stefan decided to travel with her for a bit of moral support as ann catherine entered the museum stefan took a walk around the ground to distract himself from worrying unfortunately for him he was recognized by a man who'd seen him at the museum on the day of the theft the police were called and stephane soon found himself being arrested for a second time to begin with he wasn't unduly concerned after all he'd been caught before and gotten away with it all he had to do was convince the police he was a remorseful first offender just like he had the last time and at first that little ruse seemed to be effective but then something changed the officers holding stefan stopped engaging with him and the sympathy his remorseful idiot routine had earned him evaporated overnight stefan started to fear the worst and with good reason someone in the department had uncovered the report from the previous theft in lucerne and as a result the police were no longer viewing him as an opportunist who'd snapped the bugle on impulse but as a potential serial art thief a few weeks after the arrest swiss police secured an international search warrant allowing them to enter stefan's attic apartment in mullhouse you know the one containing one and a half billion dollars worth of stolen art it's safe to say that as the team of officers arrive to carry out the search none of them were prepared for what they would find inside stefan's modest home which was nothing no works of art lining the walls no antiques no priceless jewelry not even a bugle just a bare attic apartment much like any other wait what [Music] on witnessing her boyfriend being apprehended by the police at the wagner museum in lucerne and catherine had immediately realised the dangers and sprung into action driving back home and alerting the one person every man can rely on when really hits the fan his mother and mrs breitweiser had outdone herself over the course of several days she'd gathered up every single piece of art her son had ever stolen packed it all up into her car and gotten it the hell out of there anything that sank ended up in the nearby rhone ryan canal and the paintings those centuries-old priceless works of art were burnt to ashes as part of what may very well have been the most expensive private bonfire in history the last few odds and ends were unceremoniously dumped in a nearby forest [Music] had the rhone ryan canal been just a little deeper stefan brightweiser might once again have slipped through the fingers of the justice system but it wasn't to be hikers spotted a curious twinkle from the depths of the canal about a week after the hall had been dumped and the rest is history police frogmen were called in to dredge the waterway and close to a hundred treasures from stefan's mighty horde were fished out and catalogued of course at this point the authorities had no idea how all that stuff had actually ended up in the canal but one of the officers holding stefan in switzerland got wind of the find and on a whim decided to see if he could link the treasures to his bugle thief after all they been found not too far from his home city during an interrogation the officers showed stefan a picture of one of the artifacts recovered from the canal stefan had no idea what his mother had been up to since his arrest and so on seeing an image of one of his most prized possessions in the hands of the police he reached the obvious conclusion they'd searched his apartment and found his horde the game was up stefan promptly confessed to having stolen the piece matter of factly explaining when and where he'd taken it the officer was absolutely delighted he'd figured this whole idea was a long shot but he'd hit the jackpot first time when the next image he produced got the same result an immediate detailed confession from stefan the officer could hardly believe his look what followed over the next couple of hours was one of the most unusual scenes ever played out in a police interrogation room stefan was shown image after image of rare and expensive artwork stolen from all around europe and he confessed to having stolen every single piece never in their wildest dreams had the swiss police thought that this one man could have possibly taken everything they dredged out of the canal like all on his own and yet quite clearly he had so what punishment does a man receive for stealing over a billion dollars worth of art hands chopped off at the wrists hung drawn and quartered guillotined to the face no just three years in prison stephane only served a little over two of those his mother for her part in disposing of the art served just 18 months and catherine hinting that she too had been gifted with a fairly weighty set of metaphorical balls denied having any involvement in the thefts whatsoever in fact she claimed to have had no idea stefan was even an art thief the court probably wouldn't have bought it but it seems stefan was happy to take the bullet for his girlfriend because he confirmed every word that came out of her mouth ann catherine was sentenced to six months for receiving stolen goods but she only spent a single night behind bars our story doesn't end quite there either because it turns out prison did absolutely nothing to reform stefan bradweezer in 2011 police found more than 30 works of art stashed in his house stolen naturally he was sentenced to another three years behind bars and in 2019 he was arrested once again for trying to sell a paperweight stolen from a museum in san luis on ebay i know i know he got sloppy but hey sloppy or not stefan bradweezer remains quite possibly the greatest art thief to have ever lived thanks for watching do you really enjoy my content but you literally can't be asked to use your eyes then you're in luck because you can now listen to the new random interesting facts podcast with me 42 available on youtube spotify apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast you'll find a link to it in the description below check it out today and give your eyes a break you're welcome

Channel: Thoughty2

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Length: 22min 44sec (1364 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 13 2021