Upper East Side Gallery Owner Smuggled Stolen Asian Antiques Worth Millions: DA

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — A high-profile art gallery owner on the Upper East Side has surrendered to authorities and is facing charges for a conspiracy to smuggle stolen artifacts from Asia and sell them in the United States for millions of dollars, according to a criminal complaint from the Manhattan District Attorney's office.

Nancy Wiener, owner of Nancy Wiener Gallery on East 74th Street between Park and Madison avenues, engaged in a conspiracy from 1999 to 2016 to buy, smuggle, launder and sell stolen artifacts from countries such as Afghanistan, Cambodia, China, India, Pakistan and Thailand, the DA's office said. Wiener sold artifacts to auction houses such as Sotheby's and Christie's, according to the criminal complaint.

Many of the stolen items allegedly sold by Wiener belonged to her mother Doris Wiener's collection, which was passed down when she died in 2011, the criminal complaint said. Doris Wiener was known as a "pioneer" in the field of Indian and Southeast Asian art collection and sold items to John D. Rockefeller III, Igor Stravinksy and Jacqueline Kennedy, according to an obituary.

Items from the Doris Wiener Collection were consigned to Christie's — after Sotheby's refused to take them — and have sold for a total of $12,796,437, according to the criminal complaint.

Wiener has been charged with first-degree criminal possession of stolen property, second-degree criminal possession of stolen property and fourth-degree conspiracy, according to the criminal complaint.

"Defendant (Wiener) and her co-conspirators have trafficked in illegal antiquities for decades," the complaint reads. "Transporting looted cultural property from the site of the theft to the ultimate buyer through intermediary countries in order to hide the country of origin."

Wiener and co-conspirators allegedly laundered the artifacts by restoring them to repair damage from illegal excavations, straw purchases at auction houses and by creating false provenance for artifacts to predate laws that prohibit the exportation of looted antiques, according to the criminal complaint. At least five known smuggling networks aided Wiener in stealing artifacts, according to the complaint.

An employee at the Nancy Wiener Gallery declined to comment on the allegations, and said that Wiener was not at the gallery.

Photo of Nancy Wiener Gallery from Google Maps street view