More than 300 looted artifacts have been returned to India, most of which were confiscated as part of the investigation into Subhash Kapoor – accused by US authorities of being “one of the world’s most prolific commodity smugglers” – and his associates.
Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, Jr., yesterday announced the delivery of 307 artifacts valued at approximately $4 million to a representative of the Indian government. Of these, 235 were artifacts directly related to Kapoor, whose smuggling operation extended across the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Five of the items were seized in connection with the investigation of antiquities dealer Nancy Weiner, who in 2021 pleaded guilty in a New York court to obtaining and stealing cultural property and enabling its sale using forged evidence; and one piece linked to Nayef Homsi, an art dealer from Brooklyn, who was accused in 2015 and later convicted in New York of importing looted Nepalese artifacts.
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“We are proud to return hundreds of amazing pieces to the people of India,” Bragg said in a statement. “These relics were stolen by many sophisticated and sophisticated trafficking rings – and their leaders showed no regard for the cultural or historical significance of these pieces.”
Kapoor, 72, was known among New York dealers for his ability to purchase museum-quality goods until he was first arrested on smuggling charges in Germany in 2011. Subsequent investigations revealed the scope of his criminal dealings. Between 2011 and 2022, about 2,600 items – smuggled from Afghanistan, Cambodia, India, Pakistan, Nepal and Thailand using false papers of origin – were confiscated from several Kapoor-owned storage sites in New York. The total value of the items seized by the investigators from Kapoor exceeds $143 million. Thousands are still missing.
Most of the antiquities targeted by his operation were smuggled into Manhattan and sold through Kapoor’s Madison Avenue Gallery, Art of the Past. Its buyers included a global network of collectors, galleries and museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Toledo Museum of Art in Ohio.
The DA office issued an arrest warrant for Kapoor in 2012; In 2019, he and seven of his accomplices were charged with conspiring to trade in stolen antiquities. After his conviction in New York, the DA office submitted extradition papers to Kapoor, who has been in prison in India since 2012 awaiting the completion of his ongoing trial.
A spokesperson for HSI ARTnews that ‘is expected to [Kapoor] He will be extradited to the United States upon his release from prison in India.”
One of the pieces brought back to India yesterday is the Arch Parikara, a 12th or 13th century marble statue valued at around $85,000. The piece was smuggled to New York in May 2002 and laundered to the Nathan Robin Ida Ladd Family Foundation, which donated the piece to the Yale University Art Gallery in 2007. In March, more than a dozen Kapoor-related artifacts were confiscated from the Yale Art Gallery by the Department of Security internal. Twelve of the 13 artifacts were allegedly looted from India, and one item’s origin is from Burma.
“This repatriation is the result of an investigation spanning fifteen years, in which the investigation team pursued the leadership, tracked down the funds and eventually confiscated these pieces, ensuring their return to the people of India,” Michael Alfonso, Special Agent at HSI, said in a statement.
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