ICE returns art stolen from French museum in 1981

WASHINGTON — An art piece stolen from a French museum more than 30 years ago is finally on its way home to France. On Wednesday, U.S. officials repatriated "Le Marché aux Poissons" (The Fish Market), a monotype by Camille Pissarro, to French Ambassador François Delattre.

Officials from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE); the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York (SDNY); and Interpol Washington, U.S. National Central Bureau; attended a ceremony on Jan. 25 at The Kreeger Museum in the District of Columbia to return the stolen art.

The monotype, which is a one-of-a-kind print made by painting on a sheet or slab of glass and transferring the still-wet painting to a sheet of paper, was stolen in 1981 by a man named Emile Guelton, who walked out of the Faure Museum in Aix-les-Bains, France, with the work under his jacket. The museum guard and another witness provided descriptions of the thief to French law enforcement authorities, but no one was apprehended.

In 1985, Guelton sold the monotype to a gallery in San Antonio, Texas, where it was immediately purchased by Sharyl Davis, a gallery employee, for $8,500. In 2003, Davis consigned the artwork to Sotheby's New York for auction, where it was expected to sell at an estimated price of $60,000 to $80,000.

Just prior to the auction, the Art Loss Register discovered the stolen work in the auction catalogue and notified Interpol. Interpol passed the information through ICE's Cultural Property, Art and Antiquities Unit to ICE's Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) office in New York. ICE HSI special agents in New York then initiated an investigation, and on Nov. 20, 2006, executed a federal seizure warrant and took possession of the monotype.

In January 2010, Davis contested the seizure in a civil trial in the Southern District of New York, and an eight-member jury voted unanimously in favor of the government. Following the appeals process, the monotype was officially forfeited to the United States on Nov. 22, 2011, in order to be repatriated to France.

"Returning this piece of art to the people of France is another great example of the ongoing work ICE HSI agents are doing to investigate the theft of cultural treasures and return them to their rightful owners," said ICE Director John Morton. "ICE's Homeland Security Investigations remains committed to combating cultural heritage crimes and righting the wrongs committed by the perpetrators of this illicit activity."