Breaking News: Smiley Sentenced to 3½ Years
A renowned dealer who admitted stealing nearly 100 rare antique maps was sentenced Wednesday to 3½ years in prison after one librarian described him as a “thief who assaulted history.”
E. Forbes Smiley III, a 50-year-old resident of Martha’s Vineyard, also was tentatively ordered to pay restitution of $1.9 million, though that figure may change. He is scheduled to report to prison Jan. 4.
The sentence’s length is closer to what the defence was asking for than what the libraries were demanding.
U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton said she wanted to send a dual message with the sentence.
“If you steal human treasurers, then you will go to prison, but if you help recover them, this will be taken into account and weighed in the balance,” she said.
Earlier in this afternoon’s sentencing hearing, representatives of six libraries had urged a stiff sentence for Smiley. (Associated Press coverage: Boston Globe, Hartford Courant, International Herald Tribune, Newsday; the Chicago Tribune covers the Newberry Library’s statement.)
See previous entries: Prosecutors File Brief, Explain Smiley’s Motives; Forbes Smiley’s Sentencing Memorandum; Forbes Smiley Asks for Leniency; British Library/Forbes Smiley Update; Forbes Smiley Case: More on the British Library’s Brief; British Library Demands Harsher Sentence for Smiley.
Update #1, 5:30 PM
The AP story is also available via the Belleville News-Democrat. Kim Martineau’s story for the Hartford Courant contains some additional information, notably the following:
The money Smiley will make selling his home on Martha’s Vineyard and his summer house in central Maine is expected to cover only a fraction of what he owes. As he heads off to jail broke, with his business in tatters, few of the map dealers he betrayed are holding their breath waiting for payment.
Also that, as David pointed out, state sentencing — on three larceny charges — has been delayed to next month, sentence to be served concurrently.
Update #2, 6:00 PM
The AP story is also accessible at the Stamford Advocate. For background, this Bangor News story filed prior to sentencing is a good summary.
Update #3, 8:20 PM
The Times reports that the British Library “was extremely disappointed by the leniency of the sentence imposed.”
[British Library scholarship and collections director Clive] Field said: “In the library’s view, a term of imprisonment of 42 months — equivalent to around 12 days for each of the 98 maps Smiley admitted to stealing — and financial restitution of £1 million, do not adequately reflect the seriousness of the offences.
“Nor do they represent a commensurate punishment of Smiley for his serial thefts, or a serious deterrent to other would-be thieves of cultural property.” He added: “It will go down in criminal and library history as one of the largest, most prolonged, premeditated and systematic of all thefts from libraries, and with no mitigating circumstances.”
The New Haven Independent’s coverage is extensive, and includes anecdotal material from the hearing, plus photographs.
The AP wire story has been updated: Worcester Telegram & Gazette. The first wire story is being mirrored all over the place; this is a major story. See also the Reuters wire story.
Update #4, Sept. 28 at 1:55 PM
University news coverage from the Harvard Crimson and Yale Daily News.
Forbes Smiley’s web site has been taken down; I wonder when that happened. Via MapHist.
Post your thoughts in the comments; that’s what they’re there for.
Update #5, Sept. 28 at 8:05 PM
NPR covered the story as well (via Map the Universe).
Update #6, Sept. 29 at 8:00 AM
The New Haven Register’s coverage highlights some interesting information that may have been in earlier news stories, but I didn’t register it.
On Smiley’s upcoming state sentence:
He faces another sentencing, on state first-degree larceny charges Oct. 13 in Superior Court. Both sides have agreed to a cap of five years on that sentence, which will be served concurrently with the federal sentence.
On Smiley’s prison time:
Arterton agreed with a request by Smiley’s attorney, Richard Reeve, to put off Smiley’s reporting to prison until Jan. 4, 2007, so he can continue identifying maps. She also agreed to recommend Smiley serve his time at a “satellite camp” at Fort Devon in Massachusetts because it has a medical facility for his heart problems. The federal Bureau of Prisons will make the final decision.
Update #7, Sept. 29 at 9:15 AM
The FBI put Smiley’s stolen maps on display; WTNH has footage. Windows Media only, so I can’t view it. Via Map the Universe.
Update #8, Sept. 29 at 4:50 PM
Kim Martineau’s story in yesterday’s Hartford Courant. Via MapHist.
- Buy The Island of Lost Maps at Amazon.com
- Buy The Book Thief at Amazon.com
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The Map Room is a blog about maps by
Howard:
Yep, too little too late, however for the B rits to say something about this is the pot calling the kettle black. Crininals in Britian get parking tickets so they don’t clutter up the jails. People who defend against a break in of their own house are the ones who go to jail. Note the case of Anthony Rice, who strangled and then stabbed Naomi Bryant to death.
The following is from City-life.org website and I think that Smiley got a sentence for more time in the US than he would have received in liberal Britian.
Rice, it turned out, had been assaulting women since 1972. He had been convicted for assaulting or raping a total of 15 women before murdering Naomi Bryant, and it is a fair supposition that he had assaulted or raped many more who did not go to the police. In 1982, he grabbed a woman by the throat, held a knife to her, and raped her. Five years later, while out of prison on home leave, he grabbed a woman, pushed her into a garden, held a knife to her, and raped her for an hour. Receiving a life sentence, he was transferred to an open prison in 2002 and then released two years later on parole as a low-risk parolee. He received housing in a hostel for ex-prisoners in a village whose inhabitants had been told, to gain their acquiescence, that none of the residents there was violent; five months after his arrival, he murdered Naomi Bryant. In pronouncing another life sentence on him, the judge ordered that he should serve at least 25 years: in other words, even now the law has not quite thrown away the key.
Only five days later, the papers reported that 1,023 prisoners of foreign origin had been released from British prisons between 1999 and 2006 without having been deported. Among them were 5 killers, 7 kidnappers, 9 rapists and 39 other sex offenders, 4 arsonists, 41 burglars, 52 thieves, 93 robbers, and 204 drug offenders. Of the 1,023 prisoners, only 106 had since been traced. The Home Office, responsible for both prisons and immigration, still doesn’t know how many of the killers, arsonists, rapists, and kidnappers are at large; but it admits that most of them will never be found, at least until they are caught after committing another offense. Although these revelations forced the Home Secretary to resign, in fact the foreign criminals had been treated only as British criminals are treated. At least we can truly say that we do not discriminate in our leniency.
Scandal has followed scandal. A short time later, we learned that prisoners had been absconding from one open prison, Leyhill, at a rate of two a week for three years—323 in total since 1999, among them 22 murderers.
So, while Similey should have gotten more time, I agree, the criticism from the BRITISH side is a bit ill spoken. Clean up your house first, then criticize the US.
September 28, 2006 at 12:04 PM
What I keep thinking is this: If Smiley gets a crushingly punitive sentence after cooperating, what incentive does he have to cooperate?
Better in his mind to keep mum about how many maps were stolen, make the state prove its case, get convicted for stealing 18 maps rather than 97, and draw a lighter sentence because they can’t prove he stole more.
So he gets a lighter sentence for cooperating instead of a lighter sentence because they can’t prove he stole many more. The difference is, libraries are getting some of their maps back this way.
September 28, 2006 at 12:22 PM
James Roy:
The regrettable thing, which Smiley’s lawyer has the temerity to ignore when he talks up the return of the maps, is that by virtue of the maps’ having been incised from their books, their value is irreparably reduced. It’s good that the libraries are getting (most) of their maps back. But the value of their collections are still lessened.
September 28, 2006 at 4:20 PM
Travis:
The British Library had a response to the sort of point made by Mr. Crowe here in the comments. I quote from their reply to the Forbes defense sentencing memorandum:
“We are not unmindful that Smiley has cooperated in locating maps that he had stolen over a seven and one half year period. We believe that for that effort he has received enormous consideration as set forth in our previous memorandum. He has secured that he will not be prosecuted in other districts which would have exposed him to consecutive sentences, he has received an agreement that over $2 million worth of losses will not be considered in determining the sentencing guideline level calculation, he has avoided more intrusive grand jury investigations both in this district in others. He has brought to the practical end the government’s investigation.”
What that sounds like it means is he gave up the maps to stop the government from (eventually) finding them anyway. And in doing so he lessened his sentence quite a bit. So his act was not one of altruism but of calculation.
If you’re worried about precedent, here’s a good one: If map dealers know that stealing maps will land them in federal prison for ten years (a sentence that would not be uncalled for in the federal criminal system if Smiley had been convicted of stealing just a portion of what he admitted to stealing), I suspect that map dealers won’t take the chance.
September 29, 2006 at 12:59 PM