A famous art collector, billionaire philanthropist Michael Steinhardt, has agreed to return 180 works and antiquities - including Greek ones - stolen from several countries in recent decades, New York judicial authorities announced.
The announcement by New York District Attorney Cyrus Vance, the result of years of investigations, means the 80-year-old tycoon will not be prosecuted or tried for now. However, he will be banned for life from acquiring antiquities even from the legal art market.
Vance in his statement denounced Michael Steinhardt's "decades-long insatiable appetite for stolen objects, with no regard for the legality of his actions, the authenticity of the objects he was buying and selling, or the seriousness of the cultural damage." which he brought to the whole world". The prosecutor accused the New York collector, whose fortune is estimated at $1.2 billion, of respecting "no geographical or moral barriers" and "relying on antiquities traffickers, organized crime bosses, (money laundering) and grave diggers, to increase his collections".
In recent years, Steinhardt's office and apartment on Manhattan's 5th Avenue had been searched by the services of District Attorney Vance, who had made it his priority to return the stolen works.
Steinhardt, who made his fortune thanks to a venture fund, is a known lover of Greek antiquities and had given his name to a room in the Metropolitan Museum.
According to Vance, the 180 works of art will be returned to their rightful owners in 11 countries as soon as possible. Among them are an ancient Greek stag-head urn dating back to 400 BC worth $3.5 million and an urn dating back to 1400-1200 BC. worth a million dollars.
According to APE-MPE, the value of all projects is estimated at 70 million dollars.
The prosecutor appears to have ruled out a trial for Steinhardt, saying it is better to return the items quickly "rather than keep them for years as evidence."
"The agreement stipulates that Steinhardt will be banned for life from buying antiquities," he concluded.
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