As Easter approaches, I just saw the segment from Season 5, Ep 22 (FilmRise) about the stolen paintings from Ben Stahl, who did 15 works depicting the last days of Christ, the Stations of the Cross, and the Resurrection. The art has never been recovered and according to the update, the statute of limitations has expired and anyone who bought these stolen works doesn't have to face prosecution.

How sick do you have to be to steal paintings of Christ's last days? Whether you believe in Christianity or not, that is just disgusting. And all about the money. He died in 1987 without the paintings being recovered. Ben Stahl got a letter from Norman Rockwell calling him a master.

I wonder who it was. They were aware that there was no security since this was a museum. There were at least 3 to 4 people in there, and one of them approached a Catholic priest in Sarasota offering him the paintings for ransom, $1.5 million dollars. But the priest didn't give his name and the lead didn't pan out. What happened?

Here is an article about it from 2023:

https://www.sarasotamagazine.com/arts-and-entertainment/2023/03/ben-stahl-art-sarasota

Best guess on those paintings is that they were split up and sold to churches who bought them for decoration not knowing they were stolen. None of them would look out of place in a church sanctuary, there are often paintings and pictures like that up and no one ever questions where they came from and if they were put in individually I doubt anyone would make the connection. Of course Stahl's paintings were unusually stunning, but will still blend into a church sanctuary pretty well to where i doubt their origins would be questioned. If that is the case, at least Ben could have taken some comfort that they might have been enjoyed by people of faith as they attended church.

Best guess on those paintings is that they were split up and sold to churches who bought them for decoration not knowing they were stolen. None of them would look out of place in a church sanctuary, there are often paintings and pictures like that up and no one ever questions where they came from and if they were put in individually I doubt anyone would make the connection. Of course Stahl's paintings were unusually stunning, but will still blend into a church sanctuary pretty well to where i doubt their origins would be questioned. If that is the case, at least Ben could have taken some comfort that they might have been enjoyed by people of faith as they attended church.

That's the most plausible explanation, and I doubt the churches would ask for their provenance. That is the most comforting explanation, although not to Ben's children who want the paintings back.

That's the most plausible explanation, and I doubt the churches would ask for their provenance. That is the most comforting explanation, although not to Ben's children who want the paintings back.

Oh yeah, if they are ever found they do rightfully belong to the Stahl family and should be returned no disputing that.

Its just like I said finding them after all these years is a long shot. The thing going in the Stahls favor is that the paintings are likely still out there somewhere. Because its pretty obvious whoever stole them did so for the purpose of selling them by the way they carefully removed them from their display cases to avoid damaging them. And I imagine they probably had customers lined up for them before hand. And churches seem like the most likely candidate for buying paintings like that, although art dealers with a taste for religious art are also a possibility.

But the problem is, they were most likely split up. And its really like finding a needle in a haystack because of the way they would blend in so well in church sanctuaries if indeed that is where they are. It would probably take someone who actually saw the paintings in real life and was very familiar with them stumbling on one of them somewhere. And as more time goes on and there are fewer people alive who actually did the less likely it is.

Oh yeah, if they are ever found they do rightfully belong to the Stahl family and should be returned no disputing that.

Its just like I said finding them after all these years is a long shot. The thing going in the Stahls favor is that the paintings are likely still out there somewhere. Because its pretty obvious whoever stole them did so for the purpose of selling them by the way they carefully removed them from their display cases to avoid damaging them. And I imagine they probably had customers lined up for them before hand. And churches seem like the most likely candidate for buying paintings like that, although art dealers with a taste for religious art are also a possibility.

But the problem is, they were most likely split up. And its really like finding a needle in a haystack because of the way they would blend in so well in church sanctuaries if indeed that is where they are. It would probably take someone who actually saw the paintings in real life and was very familiar with them stumbling on one of them somewhere. And as more time goes on and there are fewer people alive who actually did the less likely it is.

I agree with you, the chances have diminished, but stranger things have happened. You see art getting recovered after decades or centuries. I just hope that the Stahls are still around when they find the pictures.

Real shame this guys attempt at a tourist trap failed.

Location for reference: https://maps.app.goo.gl/W7ivtiTfbCcwH86x8

Best guess on those paintings is that they were split up and sold to churches who bought them for decoration not knowing they were stolen. None of them would look out of place in a church sanctuary, there are often paintings and pictures like that up and no one ever questions where they came from and if they were put in individually I doubt anyone would make the connection. Of course Stahl's paintings were unusually stunning, but will still blend into a church sanctuary pretty well to where i doubt their origins would be questioned. If that is the case, at least Ben could have taken some comfort that they might have been enjoyed by people of faith as they attended church.

I think you'd be surprised how many people really know their art.

Not saying it's impossible.. In fact, at first blush.. What you said sounds likely. But.. the odds of these being in various churches for all these years and.. No one ever noticing?

I dunno.. 100% I could walk by these paintings and not have a clue what I was looking at.. The name on them would mean nothing to me. But.. there's enough people out there that DO know this stuff...

I think it might be more likely that they wound up in one of two other places.. Either sold to a collector who has them sitting in his own little private art gallery.. or.. They were destroyed.

Obviously.. I can't prove you wrong, and.. Admit that you could fully be right.. Just.. the art world is pretty tight.. Even if they went to small town churches.. You'd expect someone to have caught on at least ONE of them. Some church would put a pic of their service online and one of these hardcore art people would have said "Hey, that painting in the lower left corner..."

"Hardcore Art People".. Didn't expect to string those words together today.

But.. It's like the baseball cards and other sports memorabilia that went missing.. Those are much easier to hide than paintings. But.. You get some obnoxiously rich person with low morals.. Think of Epstein.. Would anyone have been surprised if he had bunches of stolen art at his mansions?

I think you'd be surprised how many people really know their art.

Not saying it's impossible.. In fact, at first blush.. What you said sounds likely. But.. the odds of these being in various churches for all these years and.. No one ever noticing?

I dunno.. 100% I could walk by these paintings and not have a clue what I was looking at.. The name on them would mean nothing to me. But.. there's enough people out there that DO know this stuff...

I think it might be more likely that they wound up in one of two other places.. Either sold to a collector who has them sitting in his own little private art gallery.. or.. They were destroyed.

Obviously.. I can't prove you wrong, and.. Admit that you could fully be right.. Just.. the art world is pretty tight.. Even if they went to small town churches.. You'd expect someone to have caught on at least ONE of them. Some church would put a pic of their service online and one of these hardcore art people would have said "Hey, that painting in the lower left corner..."

"Hardcore Art People".. Didn't expect to string those words together today.

But.. It's like the baseball cards and other sports memorabilia that went missing.. Those are much easier to hide than paintings. But.. You get some obnoxiously rich person with low morals.. Think of Epstein.. Would anyone have been surprised if he had bunches of stolen art at his mansions?

Now I've got Jeffrey Epstein and those paintings on the brain and my head is about to explode...

Now I've got Jeffrey Epstein and those paintings on the brain and my head is about to explode...

Didn't he have a freaky Bill Clinton painting or something? Just saying.. It wouldn't have surprised me if he was involved in the underground art world.

Didn't he have a freaky Bill Clinton painting or something? Just saying.. It wouldn't have surprised me if he was involved in the underground art world.

Bill Clinton in the infamous blue dress. I'm sure there was a LOT on Epstein Island that we don't know about (and don't want to). I hope those paintings didn't end up in the hands of someone like him.

Bill Clinton in the infamous blue dress. I'm sure there was a LOT on Epstein Island that we don't know about (and don't want to). I hope those paintings didn't end up in the hands of someone like him.

Agreed.. And, to be clear.. i'm not suggesting that Epstein was involved in this at all. Just, using him as an example of someone with more money than anyone could spend in multiple lifetimes, who had a taste for art.. Leaving the rest of his.. Proclivities? Out of the equation.. Someone like that.. I could certainly see them having purchased them on the black market.

It's also possible that they're sitting in some storage unit in Topeka, KS for all we know.

I think you'd be surprised how many people really know their art.

Not saying it's impossible.. In fact, at first blush.. What you said sounds likely. But.. the odds of these being in various churches for all these years and.. No one ever noticing?


I'd say better than you may think. Ever since I first saw this segment, and thought about the odds of them being found I have always been struck by how well they would blend in to a church sanctuary. Its just the nature of them, I mean where else would they blend in so well? You could easily see one of them hanging up beside other paintings or pictures. As someone who attends church myself, I'm not sure even as an Unsolved Mysteries viewer I would make the connection right away if I saw one, unless I was specifically looking for them. And that the paintings were a series is what made them even more recognizable, but split up you have to figure that their recognizability drops considerably once they are split up, I'd say ten fold. The thieves probably realized this, and sold them in different places accordingly. and as far as someone seeing it on a church service on social media, remember that really did not become a common thing until about a decade or so ago, which was in turn decades after the theft. And by that time there were fewer and fewer people who would even recognize the paintings from either having seen them in person or on the broadcast.

And you have to take into account the mindset people have when they go to church as well. Its not just a place of worship but somewhere people go to forget about problems and even get help for them. Looking out for stolen art is simply not on anyone's radar as no one expects a church to be somewhere where you'd find it. And there are hundreds of thousands of churches across the USA alone, and if they were sold out of the country makes it even more difficult to find them and likely they could have gone unnoticed. As i said, fifteen paintings possibly hiding somewhere in fifteen of hundreds of thousands of churches I really do think qualifies for a proverbial needle in a haystack.

Do I know this for sure? No, no one knows for sure except the thieves if they are still alive. And the theories you mention are possible too. Given this was in 1969, they would have to be at least in their late 70's now.

I doubt they were destroyed personally. As I pointed out above the thieves took great pains to carefully removed them from their frames, why do that if they were planning to destroy them? The motive was obviously to sell them. Of course its been over a half century so that could have happened later, but I'd say its unlikely.

I also suspect that story about the priest seeing that guy show up in church demanding a ransom was probably a hoax. No one if they stole the paintings for ransom would contact some random priest, they would contact the family directly that makes no sense.

Agreed.. And, to be clear.. i'm not suggesting that Epstein was involved in this at all. Just, using him as an example of someone with more money than anyone could spend in multiple lifetimes, who had a taste for art.. Leaving the rest of his.. Proclivities? Out of the equation.. Someone like that.. I could certainly see them having purchased them on the black market.

It's also possible that they're sitting in some storage unit in Topeka, KS for all we know.

I'd say not, considering Jeffery Epstein was only 16 years old when this happened. :lol:

BTW, I know you were kidding all along and not serious about Epstein being involved, just pointing out how him being a teenager at the time makes it even funnier.

I'd say not, considering Jeffery Epstein was only 16 years old when this happened. :lol:

BTW, I know you were kidding all along and not serious about Epstein being involved, just pointing out how him being a teenager at the time makes it even funnier.

Well, he could have bought them later. But.. At the end of the day.. anything that he had, propertywise.. Is pretty well known.. So, if he did purchase them and had them sitting in his own private gallery.. We likely wouldn't still be talking about them being missing.

As to the theory that they have been destroyed.. Go back to what I said about hardcore art people.. and, think of the flip side.. Someone who wouldn't know art if it bit them in the ass. I put myself in that category.

If the paintings fell into the hands of someone like that.. Just say a storage unit they were in was cleaned out because the owner died.. His mother cleaned it, had no idea what it was.. tossed them in the dumpster. it's not.. Completely difficult to believe that scenario happening.

outside of the Nazi plunder.. There's not a whole lot of art that goes missing as long as this has and winds up being found. I kinda nosed around the topic yesterday.. And, one of the longest missing pieces that was finally recovered was, indeed, sitting in the home of a private collector.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornelius_Gurlitt_(art_collector)

He had a Picasso that was Nazi looted in 1940 that was discovered in 2012 and returned to its rightful owners. That's about the longest period i can find for a successful recovery.

That's 72 years, and.. we're not too far from that with the Stahl pieces.

One of the weirder I found out about is "Portrait of a Lady" by Gustav Klimt..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portrait_of_a_Lady_(Klimt)

It just turned up about 20 years later, sitting in a wall recess.

There was another one that someone left in 'lost luggage'..

But.. MOST stolen art is recovered within 20 years if it's going to be recovered.

Well, he could have bought them later. But.. At the end of the day.. anything that he had, propertywise.. Is pretty well known.. So, if he did purchase them and had them sitting in his own private gallery.. We likely wouldn't still be talking about them being missing.

As to the theory that they have been destroyed.. Go back to what I said about hardcore art people.. and, think of the flip side.. Someone who wouldn't know art if it bit them in the ass. I put myself in that category.

If the paintings fell into the hands of someone like that.. Just say a storage unit they were in was cleaned out because the owner died.. His mother cleaned it, had no idea what it was.. tossed them in the dumpster. it's not.. Completely difficult to believe that scenario happening.

outside of the Nazi plunder.. There's not a whole lot of art that goes missing as long as this has and winds up being found. I kinda nosed around the topic yesterday.. And, one of the longest missing pieces that was finally recovered was, indeed, sitting in the home of a private collector.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornelius_Gurlitt_(art_collector)

He had a Picasso that was Nazi looted in 1940 that was discovered in 2012 and returned to its rightful owners. That's about the longest period i can find for a successful recovery.

That's 72 years, and.. we're not too far from that with the Stahl pieces.

One of the weirder I found out about is "Portrait of a Lady" by Gustav Klimt..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portrait_of_a_Lady_(Klimt)

It just turned up about 20 years later, sitting in a wall recess.

There was another one that someone left in 'lost luggage'..

But.. MOST stolen art is recovered within 20 years if it's going to be recovered.

This is true, but every so often you do get a miracle like the recovered art stolen by the Nazis. I hope for the sake of Stahl's family and heirs that happens.