One of the myths about art heists is that the thieves are sophisticated break-in artists lifting works for criminal masterminds and nefarious billionaires. Just because that idea is romanticized and doesn’t describe the great majority of art thefts that doesn’t mean it never happens. Take the example of Diana Widmaier-Picasso who was a victim:
Abdelatif Redjil, described by a French police source as a “break-in ace” was in a cell, suspected of plundering a string of Paris cash machines of thousands of pounds.
Nicknamed Goldfingers and the Locksmith, he had been on the run for a month after being given a prison sentence for stealing two Picasso paintings worth £45 million from the Paris home of Diana Widmaier-Picasso, the artists’s granddaughter.
Self-styled businessman Redjil was a key witness in the long investigation into Diana’s death in the crash which also claimed the lives of her boyfriend Dodi Fayed and their driver Henri Paul in 1997.
Diana ‘Comforter’ Is Top Paris Thief (This Is London/Evening Standard)
