Munch Thieves Punished, No Munch Paintings Found

Of six men, three have been convicted of the theft of Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” and “Madonna.” The remaining three were acquitted in a Norwegian court.

They faced various charges relating to the theft of the paintings on 22 August 2004 from the Munch Museum in Oslo.

The three convicted men received prison sentences of between four to eight years for their role in the theft.

Five of the men had been charged with planning or taking part in the daylight robbery, and the sixth had been accused of handling stolen goods.

Judge Arne Lyng sentenced Bjoern Hoen to seven years for planning the robbery, Petter Tharaldsen to eight years in prison for driving the getaway car and Petter Rosenvinge received four years for supplying the vehicle.

Hoen and Tharaldsen were also ordered to pay 750m kroner (£66.3m) compensation to the City of Oslo to reflect the value of its lost paintings.

Stian Skjold, 30, who had been accused of being one of the two robbers; Morten Hugo Johansen, 39; and Thomas Nataas, 35, accused of handling stolen goods, were acquitted.
The paintings have not been recovered, but I imagine they're hanging in an organized crime boss’ living room. One silver lining in this whole thing is that these paintings are in circulation, which from a collector's perspective is really exciting. The bane of the antiquity collector is the museum because they remove artifacts from circulation forever.

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