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United States Attorney's Office District of Connecticut Press Release |
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| September 27, 2006 |
MAP THIEF SENTENCED TO 42 MONTHS Kevin J. O’Connor, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that EDWARD FORBES SMILEY III, age 50, of Chilmark, Massacusetts, was sentenced today by United States District Judge Janet Bond Arterton in New Haven to 42 months of imprisonment followed by three years of supervised release. On June 22, 2006, SMILEY waived indictment and pleaded guilty to a federal charge of theft of major artwork. SMILEY has admitted to stealing 98 rare maps that he removed from libraries and other institutions around the country and the United Kingdom, and then sold to private dealers or collectors. Most of these maps have since been recovered. “We believe that the Court balanced the severity of this crime with this defendant’s significant cooperation in recovering most of the maps that he stole and imposed a fair sentence,” U.S. Attorney O’Connor stated. According to documents filed with the Court and statements made in court, on June 8, 2005, SMILEY visited the Yale University Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library in New Haven and requested to view several books containing historical maps. As a professional dealer of rare maps, SMILEY often visited institutions with significant map collections. At approximately 11:00 a.m., the head of public services for the Beinecke Library reported finding an Exacto knife blade on the floor of the Rare Document Reading Room. She also noticed a man in the reading room looking at books containing rare maps, and, after reviewing the library register, identified the man as SMILEY. She then searched for SMILEY’s name on the internet, discovered that he was a dealer in rare maps and notified the security supervisor for the Beinecke Library, who began video and in-person surveillance of SMILEY. The security supervisor then called the Yale University Police Department, which dispatched a detective to the scene. At approximately 3:00 p.m., SMILEY exited the library. A few blocks away, the detective confronted SMILEY who revealed that he had seven maps in his possession. SMILEY was arrested at that time. Since the time of his arrest, SMILEY has cooperated in the investigation led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the United States Attorney’s Office. To date, SMILEY has identified 98 maps that he stole from a number of universities and libraries in the U.S. and abroad between January 1998 and June 2005. In addition to the Beinecke Library, the museums from which thefts occurred were the Boston Public Library, the British Library in London, the Houghton Library at Harvard University, the Massachusetts Historical Society, the Newberry Library in Chicago, the New York Public Library, and the Yale University Sterling Map Library. Today, Judge Arterton ordered SMILEY to pay restitution in the amount of $1,926,160 to his victims, the majority of whom are map dealers to whom SMILEY sold the stolen maps. However, the Court left the issue of restitution open to allow for the identification and retrieval of a few additional maps. SMILEY has agreed to continue to cooperate in this effort. Judge Arterton ordered SMILEY to report prison on January 4, 2007, at a facility to be designated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons. SMILEY has pleaded guilty in state court to larceny charges in relation to the theft of several maps from the Beinecke Library. He is scheduled to be sentenced in October. This matter was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Yale University Police Department. The Boston Police Department, Security Division for the New York Public Library, the Harvard University Police Department and the London Metropolitan Police assisted with the investigation. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Christopher W. Schmeisser.
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