Reposted from NYTimes
The first burglary was in 1999 at Keystone College in Factoryville, Pa. One of the gang, authorities said, sneaked onto the campus, smashed some glass display cases and walked off with memorabilia, including a baseball jersey once worn by Christy Mathewson, the legendary pitcher. The Everhart Museum in Scranton was next, six years later. An Andy Warholsilk screen print and a painting attributed to Jackson Pollockwere taken. Then the pace picked up.
The Space Farms: Zoo & Museum. The Lackawanna Historical Society. RingwoodManor. The Sterling Hill Mining Museum. The United States Golf Association Museum and Library. The list goes on.
Over the course of almost two decades, the crew showed up at 12 small,
low-profile museums that often lacked elaborate security systems, stripping
them of cherished items, including treasured heirlooms from America’s
sporting past, authorities say. Just a partial list includes — from the National Museum of Racing and Hallof Fame — the 1903 Belmont Stakes trophy. From the International Boxing Hall of Fame, middleweight Tony Zale’s from the Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center, seven of Berra’s championship rings, his 1954 and 1955 M.V.P. plaques, and nine of his 10 World Series rings. The only Berra World Series ring not stolen was the one he wore on his finger. “These kinds of artifacts tell people the story of who we are, and the connect us to the past in a way that really nothing else can,” said Eve Schaenen, executive director of the Berra Museum. “And now they’re gone.”
In the fall, four men charged with taking some part in the burglaries are
scheduled to go on trial in Pennsylvania, where they live. Another five
people have pleaded guilty. All nine, authorities say, avoided arrest for
some portion of 19 years as museum directors across five states woke up to
find smashed glass and things missing.
Stolen items included, clockwise from top, “Upper Hudson” by Jasper Cropsey
taken from Ringwood Manor; Roger Maris’s Hickok Belt from the Roger Maris
Museum; a gold nugget from the Sterling Hill Mining Museum.Credit...via
Ringwood Manor, West Acres Development LLP, and Sterling Hill Mining Museum. With so many heists going unsolved for so many years, one might imagine thethieves as some sort of a world-savvy, blueprint-studying, techno-literate crew so often seen in movies. But in court records and interviews, they
come across as more 7-Eleven than Ocean’s Eleven. Prepared? Yes. Sophisticated? No. Sometimes they just hit houses. One favorite burglary tool was an ax, according to court records. They drove cross country to rob the Roger Maris Museum in North Dakota, rather than take a plane.
“These guys were not world-class criminals,” said Michael Wisneski, an
official with the Everhart museum who described the thieves as schlubby.
“They were operating out of the North Pocono School District.” Most upsetting to many people is how little care was shown for the objects that were taken. A Jasper Cropsey painting from 1871 was torched. The crew did not even try to sell some of the high-profile sports memorabilia. Instead, gold and silver items like Berra’s rings, Maris’s M.V.P. plaque and the Belmont Stakes trophy were melted down and hocked as raw metals, according to court papers.
One of those arrested is accused of using some of the stolen gems to make
himself a scepter. “They could have done a smash and grab at a strip mall jewelry store andcome away with more gold,” said Lindsay Berra, the granddaughter of Yogi. When the accused crew members were finally named in an indictment lastJune, federal prosecutors laid out the inventory of what had been taken. It included stolen paintings, at least five 19th-century firearms, a Tiffany lamp and sports memorabilia that included more than 30 golf and horse
racing trophies. Prosecutors valued the lot at $4 million. Most of the
objects have not been recovered. “This was a group of dishonest people that saw easy marks,” said WilliamKroth, executive director of the Sterling Hill Mining Museum. He called them “low life grifters.”
The Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center suffered the loss of multiple items
once owned by Berra, including nine of his 10 World Series rings. They were
melted down for their metal. Credit...Steve Crandall/Getty Images
‘A Violation of Trust’ Michael Wisneski of the Everhart Museum remembers the morning in 2005 when he woke up and turned on the local television news. To his surprise, the reporters were in the parking lot of his museum, talking about a break-in. When he arrived at the building, he found the back door smashed in, the Warhol and Pollock gone. “It felt like somebody broke into your house,” he said. “It was a violation of trust or of security.”
According to authorities, Thomas Trotta, 48, of Moscow, Pa., had used a
ladder to smash the door of the museum. Of the nine people later arrested, Trotta was the one relied on to ventureinto the museums to take things, according to court papers. But he was helped in meaningful ways, authorities say, by Nicholas Dombek, 53, who has known Trotta since they were teenagers. After Trotta was arrested, he accused Dombek of being the ringleader, according to court papers. But Dombek’s lawyer, Ernest D. Preate Jr., said in an interview that Trotta was the ringleader, and he described his client as a handyman, not a
mastermind, who did not even operate a computer.
Trotta’s lawyer, Joseph R. D’Andrea, declined to comment.
Thomas Trotta, who is identified in court papers as the person who
personally, entered the museums and stole items. He has pleaded guilty to
theft of a major artwork. Credit...via Pennsylvania Department of
Corrections Dombek, who has pleaded not guilty, is from Thornhurst, a rural patch of Pennsylvania, where he lives on a street that carries his family name. His father and his brother were both science teachers, but Dombek never
graduated from high school, and in a 2019 court hearing testified that he
was in financial straits and was two months behind on his mortgage. Still, he was not without ambition and, according to a search warrantaffidavit, Trotta told investigators that Dombek had constructed something like a chemistry lab in his garage. Dombek himself spoke during the court hearing of hoping to cure cancer by tinkering with the chemical properties of water.
Dombek’s garage became an informal headquarters where the group planned
break-ins, Trotta told investigators according to court papers. It was
there that Dombek constructed a collapsible ladder and other tools for
Trotta to use at heists, afterward using the space to melt down stolen
memorabilia, according to court papers.
Image Nicholas Dombek, who authorities have charged in the museum burglaries. Each museum was studied before a break-in to determine access, security measures and what looked good to steal, investigators said in court papers. During one scouting trip, Dombek tested the thickness of a display case at the golf museum in New Jersey by scratching the glass with a coin, the
papers said. Trotta would sometimes wear a disguise, dressing as a firefighter when the stole from the Roger Maris Museum, and as a Hasidic Jew when they went to break into the Harvard Mineralogical & Geological Museum, the indictment said. (The theft was called off because a particular diamond they hoped to steal was no longer on display.) The other accomplices are accused of playing a variety of roles: sometimes as getaway drivers, sometimes as transporters of stolen materials after the
burglary. At the Berra Museum, the thieves cut the glass to gain entry, and were able to elude security cameras during one of the larger hauls, according to
museum staff. “They knew exactly where to break in,” Schaenen said. “They had a method toit.” The Harness Racing Museum & Hall of Fame in Goshen, N.Y., had a motion sensor but no cameras in place when the thieves arrived in 2012. It lost 14 trophies and afterward, Janet Terhune, the executive director, said she
called the staff of the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in
Saratoga to warn them to increase their security. Both museums upgraded
their protection. It didn’t matter. The next year, Trotta smashed glass displays in Saratoga with a center-punch tool and grinder and took off with five trophies, according to court records.
Brien Bouyea, the communications director for the Saratoga museum, said the
institution had a solid security system in place at the time of the thefts.
“The smash-and-grab style of the robbery, however, narrowly beat the police response time,” he said. The Lackawanna Historical Society in Pennsylvania lost a Tiffany lamp in a 2010 burglary. Credit...via The Lackawanna Historical Society
A Fateful Traffic Stop Even with the snow blanketing Route 307 outside Scranton early on the morning of March 4, 2019, the maroon Pontiac was swerving too much.
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