BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Romanian prosecutors are investigating if a painting by Pablo Picasso that was snatched from a museum in the Netherlands six years ago has turned up in Romania.
Four Romanians were convicted in the 2012 heist of Picasso’s “Tete d’Arlequin” and six other valuable paintings from the Kunsthal gallery in Rotterdam.
One of them, Olga Dogaru, told investigators she burned the paintings in her stove to protect her son, the alleged leader of the thefts. She later retracted the statement.
Romania’s Directorate for the Investigation of Organized Crime and Terrorism said Sunday it was examining the circumstances of a painting that a fiction writer said she found under a tree based on an anonymous tip.
The work, purported to be the stolen Picasso, was given to the Dutch embassy in Romania on Saturday.