How an ordinary New Mexico couple pulled off $150 million art heist
Jerry and Rita Alter were viewed by friends and family as harmless eccentrics.
Known for loving exotic travel, they celebrated their journeys with self-indulgent slide shows. Jerry was a jazz musician, a commercially unsuccessful artist, an unpublished author and a retired New York City public school teacher. Rita made a career as a speech pathologist. Cheesy statuary, including pyramids made from brightly colored tiles, cluttered their backyard in the small town of Cliff, NM, while Jerry’s paintings and the couple’s souvenirs filled the modest home’s interior.
But the Alters had a secret: They were accomplished art thieves.
That fact came to light in 2017, after Rita passed away at age 81 — Jerry had died in 2012 at the same age — when a local antiques merchant stumbled across a $150 million Willem de Kooning artwork hanging in the deceased couple’s master bedroom.
Damn interesting article.....Just goes to show, if you are not greedy you can get away with a lot.
Jerry and Rita Alter were viewed by friends and family as harmless eccentrics.
Known for loving exotic travel, they celebrated their journeys with self-indulgent slide shows. Jerry was a jazz musician, a commercially unsuccessful artist, an unpublished author and a retired New York City public school teacher. Rita made a career as a speech pathologist. Cheesy statuary, including pyramids made from brightly colored tiles, cluttered their backyard in the small town of Cliff, NM, while Jerry’s paintings and the couple’s souvenirs filled the modest home’s interior.
But the Alters had a secret: They were accomplished art thieves.
That fact came to light in 2017, after Rita passed away at age 81 — Jerry had died in 2012 at the same age — when a local antiques merchant stumbled across a $150 million Willem de Kooning artwork hanging in the deceased couple’s master bedroom.
Damn interesting article.....Just goes to show, if you are not greedy you can get away with a lot.
