Police sting led to return of stolen masterpiece

REBECCA FOWLER

The trial into the theft of the The Scream, Edvard Munch's pounds 35m masterpiece, switched from Oslo in Norway, to London this week to discover how Scotland Yard won back the painting for the Norwegians after it was stolen in one of the most dramatic art thefts in recent decades.

British police revealed yesterday how they launched an undercover operation to recover The Scream in a carefully planned sting at a Norwegian hotel, after a tip-off from a British solicitor who had been contacted by one of the thieves.

The operation was carried out by two undercover officers known as Sidney Walker and Chuck Roberts, who posed as art experts representing the J Paul Getty Museum to set up a bogus pounds 315,000 deal.

They gave statements during a two-day hearing at Bow Street magistrates' court in central London to protect their identities because under Norwegian law witnesses cannot give evidence anonymously.

John Butler, former head of Scotland Yard's Fine Art Squad, masterminded the operation with Norwegian police, after a secret meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark, in March 1994.

"These two officers are the most experienced undercover officers in the United Kingdom, and they had done dozens of operations throughout the world," Mr Butler said yesterday.

"We had to have a very fluid plan ...The trick is to protect undercover officers, don't lose the money, and try to achieve your objective."

The Scream, Norway's most treasured painting, was stolen from the National Gallery in Oslo in February 1994.

Two men used a step ladder to climb into the gallery, grabbed the painting and then disappeared.

The thieves demanded a pounds 690,000 ransom for the work, completed in 1893, which depicts a waif-like figure gasping with angst beneath a blood red sky, but the Norwegian government refused to agree to their demands.

When a British solicitor, codenamed the London Clue, contacted Mr Butler to say that one of the criminals involved in the theft had contacted him.

Scotland Yard devised a plan, working with Norwegian police, to recapture the painting. Mr Butler worked with Inspector Lief Lire, head of Oslo's serious theft squad.

Last May, Mr Roberts travelled to Oslo, posing as a museum representative. In the Sky Bar bar of the Plaza hotel he met Jan Olsen, one of four men on trial for the theft, and Einar Ulving, a "facilitator" who is not facing charges. There the men discussed a deal.

However, the following day over breakfast Mr Olsen demanded pounds 300,000 for the painting, and a further pounds 15,000 for expenses, and was shown the money by Mr Walker, in cash, in a deposit box at the hotel.

On 7 May, Mr Ulving drove Mr Roberts to his summer house in Aasgaardstrand, 55 miles south of Oslo, where the painting was hidden in the cellar. "It was wrapped in a blue bed sheet and we unwrapped it carefully," Mr Roberts said.

"I saw The Scream as I have seen it in reproductions. It could tell it was the original and not a copy."

He took the painting back to his hotel room, via the fire escape, while Mr Walker went with two of the alleged thieves to pick up the money.

But the thieves were arrested at the Grand Hotel in Oslo, the meeting point where it was agreed that they would pick up the money, although Mr Walker said he was surprised only two officers had been sent for the bust. He commented that they were carrying a bag which appeared to contain sandwiches.