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Nov. 4--The FBI is considering a billboard campaign as part of its international hunt for $300 million worth of artwork that was stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston in 1990 by thieves who masqueraded as police officers to get inside, according to the agency
"We are evaluating investigative techniques designed to solicit information from the public regarding the investigation, including the use of billboards," said Thomas Larned, an assistant special agent-in-charge of the FBI's Boston office.
The Financial Times of London reported on Oct. 21 that Eric Ives, head of the FBI's major theft unit in Washington, said the FBI planned to appeal for the public's help on billboards posted throughout the United States, and possibly overseas, sometime next year. Ives could not be reached for comment yesterday.
Larned said that using billboards as part of a publicity campaign was under consideration, "however we have no imminent plans."
The stolen artwork includes a Vermeer; three Rembrandts, including his only seascape; five Degas drawings; and a Manet.
Cathy Deely, a spokeswoman for the museum, declined to comment on the ongoing investigation or the possibility of a billboard campaign. But she said that "we are optimistic that they will be returned."
Julian Radcliffe -- chairman of the Art Loss Register in London, which is the world's largest database of stolen art and antiques dedicated to their recovery -- said he had never heard of billboards being used to help locate stolen pieces. But he added that law enforcement officials frequently advertise in art trade magazines.
"The people who might know about the paintings will tend to be criminals or near-criminals, and clearly the FBI has been working on those sorts of people in the past without a great deal of success," Radcliffe said. "So making a more general appeal may be necessary to widening the net, but I think the chances of it attracting somebody who knows where the pictures are is probably not very high."
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