Christopher Marinello has spent the past 30 years tracking down stolen masterpieces by artists such as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse and Andy Warhol.
Museums, private collectors and police forces worldwide turn to the straight-talking New York-raised, London-based lawyer to find lost artworks and antiquities.
Marinello, 62, founded Art Recovery International in 2013 and pursues brazen thieves, working worked alongside the authorities, auction houses and insurance firms.
The “Sherlock Holmes of Nazi-looted art” recovered Matisse’s Femme Assise, one of the first works of art returned from the Hildebrand Gurlitt hoard. To date, he has recovered at least $600 million of stolen art, rare automobiles and “million-dollar watches”.
“Criminals caught on to the watch market and have been stealing them all over the world,” he said. “Now they’re into women’s handbags.”
In recent months the super-rich have called upon Marinello to locate Hermès handbags swiped during robberies at their properties. Handbags by the French fashion house, such as the Kelly or Birkin, are known to triple in value over time — especially versions in exotic skins — and can sell for six figures at auction.
A Hermès Birkin bag
GETTY IMAGES
“Sotheby’s and Christie’s had Old Masters and watch sales, then all of a sudden they were holding luxury handbag and sneaker sales,” Marinello said. “Can you believe they are selling off Michael Jordans for up to $8 million? You can follow the progression.”
Cars have a unique chassis number, watches are embossed with serial numbers and an artwork that is signed is unique by virtue of its creation, but Marinello says that most design houses are yet to implement a registration system for their most exclusive handbags.
“Hermès is starting to attach serial numbers to its bags,” he said. “If we find a stolen one and the number matches we can confirm to both the police and the auction house that they’re selling a stolen item.”
A pair of Air Jordan 13 sneakers that Michael Jordan wore during the 1998 NBA Finals was sold at Sotheby’s in 2023 for $2.2 million
TIMOTHY A CLARY/GETTY IMAGES
He was speaking after Cheshire police appealed for information about more than 100 “rare and one-of-a-kind” handbags — including several bespoke Hermès bags — that were snatched from a property in Alderley Edge on February 17. Thieves are believed to have used a ladder to scale the property on Macclesfield Road and entered through a skylight. Jewellery and a gold watch were also taken.
The victim, who has not been identified, has offered a reward of £10,000 for information that leads to a conviction. No arrests have been made.
Marinello, who was recently alerted to a report of stolen handbags worth an estimated £1 million, said: “It’s not the value of the leather but the integrity of the piece that’s valuable. [Criminals] will move it to Eastern Europe, China, and parts of the Middle East where they think they can sell them without people asking any questions.”
Organised criminals will typically pass on these items to a “fence” — a person who knowingly buys stolen goods and moves them on through the black market.
A Kelly bag can sell for six figures at auction
Marinello initially went to art school before being encouraged to go to law school in the mid-1980s. Working as a civil litigator, he remained close to his appreciation of fine art and design when he set up his own practice and acted for art galleries, dealers and insurance companies in cases involving disputed artworks.
“I was handling too many cases to try every single day. Very quickly I was forced to come up with solutions on settling cases. I would get parties together, listen to [each side] and I developed a rapid way of strategising and settling cases — and that’s exactly what the art world wants,” he said. “They don’t want their names plastered across The Times; they want to settle discreetly and confidentially.”
In testimonials, clients have described him as a “mixture of detective, terrier and pin-sharp lawyer”.
Marinello said: “At this point in my career, 50 per cent of my work is pro bono for governments and museums that can’t afford my services.”
His core team is small but he retains the services of lawyers, investigators and researchers in the UK, across Europe and in the US. The nature of his work means that Marinello operates from an undisclosed location.
“I once had a £20 million painting in my office; we had to take the railing off because it was 11ft tall. Since then we’ve stopped publishing our address, because if people knew then these items would go missing.”
• The detectives on the trail of stolen masterpieces
Marinello said that recovering Nazi-looted work was “very rewarding — it’s very moving to meet the families and present them with something they never thought they would see again”.
The expansion of his work into hunting down some of the world’s most desirable stolen watches began ten years ago and illustrates the changing nature of criminality.
Experts believed that the introduction of the Apple watch would signal the death of the Swiss watch industry. “But the watch companies responded by promoting their brands and expertise in creating meticulous timepieces that were works of art,” Marinello said. “This created a demand for wristwatches that didn’t read your heartbeat and everything else you do.”
As social media flourished, organised gangs and opportunistic thieves were able to spot victims online and track their movements via geo-tagged images in order to steal their watches.
“In the early days it was Patek Philippe, Rolex, Vacheron Constantin, Breguet — all the traditional brands,” said Marinello. “Then I started getting contacted about Richard Mille watches; Formula 1 drivers, footballers and hip-hop moguls bought these watches and they started hitting six figures, which is just insane.”
Marinello says it is vital to insure Rolexes and expensive handbags
The Times has tracked several watch robberies through the courts and data shows that the number of incidents across England and Wales has surged by 26 per cent since Covid-19. Rolex’s Datejust, Omega’s Seamaster and Patek Philippe’s Aquanaut, worth up to £84,000, were among the watches ripped from victims’ wrists.
Police chiefs are under pressure to tackle rising rates of robbery; police-recorded incidents increased by 8 per cent to 81,019 in the year to the end of last March.
Marinello said theft victims enlisted his services because “the police don’t do anything” to try to recover their stolen property.
“I wish I didn’t have to have this job, I wish crime didn’t exist,” he said. “It’s a shame that people want to take what doesn’t belong to them. What infuriates me is when a painting is taken from a church or somebody contacts me and says: ‘A watch given to me by my late father has been stolen.’
“I’ve tried to get the police involved and they’ve told me: ‘The watch was stolen in the UK and it showed up for sale in Switzerland — we don’t have jurisdiction there so we’re closing the case.’”
“A good officer that’s willing to go the extra mile will file a treaty request via Interpol and communicate with foreign law enforcement. But the police are too busy with mental health-related cases and terrorism issues. The last thing they’re going to do is help you recover your watch.”
When asked if he wears one, Marinello laughed and said: “I wear a £50 Timex running watch but I have my eye on a vintage Patek Philippe. I keep asking my dealers to find one for me.”
Marinello does not believe that people should deprive themselves of luxury items for fear of becoming a victim of crime but he urges consumers to mitigate against potential losses.
“You only live once. You work your whole life. There’s nothing like buying something you always wanted as a kid, or a dream Rolex or handbag, whatever it might be — but get it insured. It’s a cat-and-mouse game out there and you can’t rely on law enforcement to get your stuff back. Be mindful of your surroundings — and don’t boast about your possessions on social media.”
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