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Pastimes : Clown-Free Zone... sorry, no clowns allowed -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MythMan who wrote (301906)	2/11/2005 8:45:18 AM
From: Pogeu Mahone	Respond to of 436258

French connection: FBI wants to quiz mogul over Gardner paintings By Tom Mashberg Friday, February 11, 2005 In a bizarre twist to a 15-year-old mystery, two Boston FBI agents are in Paris this week probing whether an indicted French media mogul knows the whereabouts of art heisted from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in March 1990, the Herald has learned. According to an American art dealer and historian, the agents want access to French legal records surrounding the arrest of Jean-Marie Messier, the embattled former CEO of the entertainment conglomerate Vivendi-Universal. The art expert, who spoke on condition of anonymity, was present for six hours on Tuesday when the FBI agents and a French prosecutor discussed whether Messier, under indictment for embezzlement and securities manipulation, might have acquired paintings stolen from the Gardner while building his own collection in the 1990s. ``It was a good introductory session,'' said the art historian, who has assisted in the recovery of stolen art in the past and brought the Messier angle to the attention of the bureau. ``It's a complex thing getting the agencies to cooperate.'' The art expert told French officials he believes some of the most prominent Gardner works, among them a Vermeer and three Rembrandts, were shipped to Paris by way of Genoa in the 1990s. He asserts several pieces of art ended up in the private collections of various rich Europeans like Messier. The art specialist, who says he gleaned his information from underworld contacts and his own relentless Gardner sleuthing, has pushed the Messier angle for more than a year in talks with the FBI. With the Gardner case stymied, the bureau decided to fly two special agents, lead Gardner investigator Geoffrey J. Kelly and bureau official Patrick Gibbon, to Paris along with the art dealer, whose fare was picked up by the bureau. A U.S. Embassy legal attache, Jay Abbott, was present when the men met with a French prosecutor attached to the office of Paris investigative magistrate Henri Pons. FBI officials in Boston and French law enforcement authorities declined to comment on the meeting, and a press aide at the U.S. Embassy in Paris did not respond to two voice-mail messages. But French attorney Olivier Metzner, who represents Messier, said by phone from Paris the allegations were ``totally without merit'' and ``the kind of information pulled from a trash pail.'' ``Mr. Messier would never traffic in stolen art,'' he said. ``We will sue for libel anyone who says so.''