Retired Prof Accused of Being a Master Thief Who Stole $1 Million in Art and Jewels

Retired Prof Accused of Being a Master Thief Who Stole $1 Million in Art and Jewels

Everyone needs to find something productive to do in retirement, right?

The New York Post reports:

Gentleman thief ‘stole $1M’ in art and jewels: Professor, 79, even left thank-you notes

Lawrence Gray, a retired professor, has great taste, immaculate manners, glittering social connections — and sticky fingers, authorities allege.

The 79-year-old is accused of making off with at least $1 million of jewels and art from homes in five states, some where he had been invited to weddings or fundraisers.

At some he even left an elegant thank-you note.

Appearing in a Manhattan court Tuesday, he was the model of a liberal arts professorial, in blazer, button-down and leaning on a cane.

But according to prosecutors and previous civil claims, Gray is really the model of a clever thief who first targeted his lover – and then her affluent friends.

In 2004, the professor of political science at John Cabot University in Rome was in Washington D.C. when he met Jacqueline Quillen, a granddaughter of Alfred Lee Loomis, an investment banker and one of the 20th century’s most accomplished physicists, and a divorcee.

Quillen took trips to Italy while he would stay at the mother-of-three’s home in East Hampton, New York. For a decade, the pair kept largely separate homes but shared a busy social life.

Quillen, who ran the wine department of Christie’s, hosted dinner parties at her home in Washington’s tony Georgetown, where Gray would stay with her when not in Rome.

But what she did not know was that Gray was, allegedly, stealing from her and from her friends. He even took the 1920s Steuben martini glasses she had been gifted by Lomis, her son Quillen alleged in a civil suit.

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