Man Guilty on 1 Theft Count in Ruby Case

A Woodland Hills man accused of stealing a $1-million, 6.76-carat Burmese ruby was found guilty Thursday of grand theft as a convoluted case known around the courthouse as “The Great Ruby Caper” drew to a close.

Jewelry broker Ali Reza Paravar, 42, faces up to five years in state prison after being convicted of the most serious charge against him. Although Paravar did not actually steal the rare, blood-red stone known as the “Mona Lisa of rubies,” his actions qualify as theft because he was holding the jewel and did not return it to the rightful owner, prosecutor Ed Abele argued in court.

Attorneys in the case declined to comment Thursday because the jury still is deliberating other counts against other defendants.

The jury of six women and six men today resume deliberating counts against Rasekh Uddin Siddiqui, 46, of Chatsworth and Behzad Saba, 33, of Irvine, who are accused of receiving stolen property in connection with a scheme to sell the stolen ruby back to its original owner for $360,000. They insisted they were merely acting as middlemen to help the owner retrieve his prized gem.

In delivering its guilty verdict, the jury appeared to reject defense arguments that the case was nothing more than a business dispute.

The caper came to light last summer when nearly two dozen law enforcement officials, backed up by a police helicopter, arrested five men in an Encino parking lot following a sting operation. The ruby’s original owner had agreed to meet the defendants to buy back the gem. Police found the ruby in Paravar’s pocket during the raid.

According to testimony, German gem trader Peter Morlock gave the ruby in 1990 to a man named Ron Levi to sell on consignment. The agreement called for Levi to either return the stone within two days or pay Morlock $527,000. Instead, the charismatic Levi gave the gem to Paravar--a move defense attorneys claimed was common practice among jewel wholesalers.

Paravar testified that he refused to return the ruby to Morlock because Levi owed him $300,000 and had given him the gem as collateral. When Paravar refused to hand over the gem, Morlock went to police in October, 1990.

As the police investigation began, Levi disappeared. He has not been charged in Los Angeles, but has been indicted by a grand jury in Texas in another alleged gem-consignment scam.

The trial offered a rare glimpse into the close-knit downtown Jewelry Mart, the second-largest jewelry district in the nation, which has been described as a shadowy world where consignment transactions are common and multimillion dollar deals rest on a handshake.