NORTHRIDGE : Businessman Charged With Trying to Sell Stolen Art
The owner of a San Fernando Valley pancake restaurant was charged Friday with trying to sell stolen artworks worth about $9 million, becoming the third person arrested in the theft.
Vasilios Marmaras, 36, of Northridge was apprehended at the restaurant, said Detective Bill Martin of the Los Angeles Police Department.
The nine paintings, which authorities have recovered, include works by Pablo Picasso, Edgar Degas and Marc Chagall. They were taken from a storage locker in Northridge last year.
Peter MacKenzie, 43, a Chatsworth carpenter, and Alan McArthur, 38, a Granada Hills electrician, were arrested on Tuesday and charged with the theft.
Martin said Marmaras tried to sell the paintings about two weeks ago. “The figure we have is that he originally tried to sell them for $3.5 million,” said Martin, who is the Police Department’s main art theft investigator.
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