Thieves Steal 4 Rare Violins From Car Trunk
Four handcrafted 18th- and 19th-Century violins valued at more than $350,000 were stolen from the trunk of an antique dealer’s car at Los Angeles International Airport on Friday in what Los Angeles police called “a real professional job.”
Pacific Division detectives appealed to the public for information on the whereabouts of the antique instruments, explaining that their marketplace is “extremely limited.”
Their owner, Donald Robertson, of Albuquerque, N.M., described them as a J. B. Guadagnini 1774 violin worth $195,000; two Nicolas Gagliano violins of the 1770s, both valued at $100,000, a Pierre Silvestre 1857 violin, $28,000, a Czech viola, $2,000, and three rare bows.
Robertson told detectives that he brought the instruments to Los Angeles to turn them over to a Ventura dealer for resale. They were left in the trunk of his rented car in a parking structure while he went to meet a plane.
Police said a thief or thieves apparently picked the trunk lock, lifted the instruments and re-locked the trunk.
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