Landau-Savedoff : dirty rotten scoundrels collection 2010-2013 complied by Lee Arnold

Format:

Other

Contributor:

Arnold, Lee, 1959- christener of the Sparkmeister.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Rats--Campaigns and battles.

Rats.

Canadians--Psychological aspects.

Canadians.

Thieves--Canada.

Thieves.

Criminals--Social life and customs.

Criminals.

Libraries--Pennsylvania--Philadelphia.

Libraries.

Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

Collectors and collecting--History.

Collectors and collecting.

Cultural property--Protection--International cooperation.

Cultural property.

Intellectual property.

Material culture.

Museums--Acquisitions.

Museums.

Antiquities--Collection and preservation.

Antiquities.

Art and state.

Culture and law.

Cultural policy.

Landau, Barry, common thief.

Landau, Barry.

Savedoff, Jason James, even more common thief.

Savedoff, Jason James.

Tremaglio, Greg, NARA special agent.

Tremaglio, Greg.

Yokelson, Mitch, NARA special agent.

Yokelson, Mitch.

Kazlauskas, Matt, FBI special agent.

Kazlauskas, Matt.

Heim, Sarah, tireless seeker of justice.

Heim, Sarah.

Physical Description:

unpaginated : color illustrations, color portraits, color facsimilies ; 28 cm.

Other Title:

Barry and Sparky : together again

Place of Publication:

2010-2013

Philadelphia, Pa. : Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 2011.

Summary:

This is an archival collection documenting the sad case of the theft of thousands of items from HSP by Barry Landau and his wifty side-kick Jason Savedoff (a/k/a Sparky)--from December 2010 through June 2011. The good news is that HSP got everything back and the FBI got their man (or men, in this case). The Pathetic Duo were arrested in Baltimore in the act of stealing items from the Maryland Historical Society. MHS and HSP were two of the 22 collections hit by this Purloining Pair, from New England to the Carolinas. This tale of woe is both fascinating and borderline lurid. Barry was a self-described presidential scholar; Sparky was a cater-waiter and a stealth membership salesman at an upscale gym (don't ask). Barry met Sparky at this health club in Manhattan. They soon became friends/associates (who knows...), with Barry taking on a bit of a mentoring role. After they were caught, Sparky started to talk (receiving a reduced sentence in the end). But their friendship ended in that jail cell in B'more. Barry claimed he (Barry) was an innocent old man who was led into this life of historical crime by this intelligent young upstart. Sparky insisted that he (Sparky) was just a naive Canadian boy, alone in the big city, who was corrupted into a life of crime by an older man with no moral compass. They probably, ultimately, were both correct. For instance, Barry had their sports jackets altered with larger interior pockets to hide the loot (the FBI even has the tailoring receipt). Barry would case the joints, looking for the best places to sit to be out-of-view of both staff and security cameras. Barry would often distract staff with long boring anecdotes about his life while Sparky did the stealing, just yards away. Sparky would also pull the cards out of HSP's card catalogue in order to cover their trail, following up with anonymous phone calls to staff to see if they pulled everything--and keeping a very handy chart of it all. They stole from presidential libraries, university libraries, and special collections (like HSP). But Charm City was no charm for them; it was their Waterloo. Barry was eventually sentenced to seven years in prison and Jason to one year. HSP Reading Room staff, led by the intrepid Sarah Heim, cooperated fully with the FBI/NARA investigation and conviction (and were present during both sentencing trials). The FBI and NARA special agents (Kazlauskas, Tremaglio and Yokelson) were THE BEST. Since this incident, HSP has upgraded its security system and instituted new policies and procedures to thwart this type of thing happening in the future. It has also recreated/refiled all those ripped-out catalogue cards and has since had all the card catalogues (nearly a million cards) digitized.

Contents:

Folder 1 (mug shots, court papers, registration cards, misc. info.)

Folder 2 (internal and external HSP emails)

Folder 3 (published articles following the case)

Folder 4 (copies of call slips)

Notes:

Photocopy. Philadelphia, Pa. : Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 2010-2013.

Local Notes:

The Landau-Savedoff Memorial Reference Collection on Cultural & Heritage Purloinment.

OCLC:

948013001