Master Thieves by Stephen Kurkjian Page A

Hawley asked point-blank. Mashberg didn’t hesitate.
    â€œOn a scale of one to ten, I’d say close to a ten,” Mashberg responded. Later that day, the museum put out a statement saying that what Mashberg saw could be “either the original or a close replica.”
    In the near quarter-century since the theft, Mashberg’s viewing, which he walked me through in a three-hour, on-the-record interview, remains the most authoritative statement by a credible source that any of the thirteen stolen paintings had been seen. Yet the account has been subsequently tarnished: Federal authorities tested paint chips Youngworth supplied to Mashberg to verify his story, and found them to be clearly dated from Rembrandt’s era (seventeenth century) but not a match to The Storm on the Sea of Galilee . The museum’s security director argued that the heavily varnished Rembrandt painting could not have been unfurled in the way Mashberg described. Even Mashberg now doubts that what he saw was in fact The Storm on the Sea of Galilee . Perhaps it was just a very good replica.
    â€œMy doubt comes from [the fact that] nothing ever came of it,” Mashberg said in a recent interview. “Here was the painting literally seeming like it was inches away from being recovered, then, poof, it’s gone and the whole potential scenario is wiped out, and everybody off on other trails. I know what I saw but if I am getting dubious responses, then I have to own to the possibility that I was wrong.”
    Mashberg’s bombshell article, which strongly implied that Youngworth had arranged the viewing, touched off a mad scramble by FBI agents and federal prosecutors. They tried to convince Youngworth to explain to them how he had arranged the viewing, how he might have gotten his hands on the painting, and if nothing else, where the viewing had taken place. But Youngworth held firm: He would cooperate only if all of his demands for immunity—dropping of the charges against him and releasing his friend, the master art thief Myles Connor, who was serving time in federal prison on drug-related charges—were granted.
    But while numerous other lowlifes like Youngworth had sought money from the museum on the pledge that they could produce the missing paintings, this junkie-criminal now had something none of them did: credibility.
    Youngworth met with Hawley, museum trustee Arnold Hiatt, and several other museum officials, and traded on that credibility. He asked for $10,000 so he could continue his pursuit of the artwork. Hiatt gave him the money as a loan. It was never repaid, and for his generosity Hiatt was subpoenaed to testify along with Hawley before a federal grand jury on whether Youngworth had coerced the money out of him.
    Meanwhile, Youngworth refused to give investigators, museum officials, or Mashberg any details about how he got his hands on the stolen Rembrandt. He cryptically suggested to Mashberg in a note that his connections inside Boston’s underworld, specifically his ties to the Rossetti gang in East Boston, had played a role, not to mention that Youngworth’s sister had dated a member of the gang.
    The note was confusingly worded and has long been scrutinized for information. It stated in part: “You have to remember the Salemme’s visitation power had to be endorsed by NY. Had it not been, NY would have taken the whole as they are now going to and so I don’t know power. . . . But Bobby D. wasabout a centimeter away from being made. And they clipped him. They were all rough. Not one of them were made. Richie D. recruited that crew in Walpole, with exception of Ritchie Gillis and he is first cousin to the Rossettis. And that’s how he got in.”
    Here’s one way of interpreting what the note said: The New York underworld had given Frank Salemme, whom the Rossetti gang reported to, approval for Youngworth to be allowed to take Mashberg to see the painting. Those