SCOTLAND.- Edward Black of The Scotsman reported that an art dealer has been charged by the American authorities with masterminding a multi-million-pound scam in which he conned collectors and auction houses, including Christie’s in London, into buying forgeries. Ely Sakhai, based in New York, is accused of buying masterpieces by artists including Monet, Renoir and Paul Gauguin, before selling copies. The respected dealer, 52, is said to have sold the originals at auction, netting a massive profit, court documents allege. The FBI claims that Sakhai, who owns two art shops in New York, began the scam 14 years ago when he bought Chagall’s “La Nappe Mauve” for £173,000 at Christie’s in South Kensington. Three years later, in 1993, he sold a forgery of the painting to a buyer in Tokyo for £285,000.

He later sold his original back to Christie’s, according to papers filed in a Manhattan court. His apparent fraud gave top auction houses Christie’s and Sotheby’s a shock in May 2000 when both offered Gauguin’s “Vase de Fleurs” (Lilas) for auction at the same time. An expert hired by Christie’s deemed its painting a fake, and the sale was cancelled, but Sotheby’s went ahead with its sale, making £169,000 for Sakhai. Sakhai’s alleged scam came to light when a collector bought a work by expressionist Paul Klee. He complained when Sakhai tried to sell the same painting at Sotheby’s, according to the charges.

Sakhai was arrested in Manhattan earlier this week and charged with eight counts of fraud. The scam is alleged to have involved 25 paintings. He faces a maximum of 20 years in jail on each count, and a fine of £1.1 million if convicted. An FBI agent said Sakhai had been involved in art fraud for a number of years. "Sakhai has for years engaged in a scheme to defraud the international art market through the sale of forged works of art," said the FBI’s James Wynne. Sakhai is currently free on £550,000 bail.

The case is further proof that nothing in the art world is guaranteed - even the “Mona Lisa” may not be the original. Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece went missing from the Louvre for 15 months in 1911 after an audacious theft and some people still claim that a copy was substituted for the real thing. In 1985, the John Paul Getty Museum in California reputedly paid £5 million for a sixth-century BC Greek statue, known as a “Kouros”, only to find that its provenance could not be substantiated and it was very likely a fake, possibly made by one of Rodin’s assistants in Paris in about 1900.

Scotland suffered its own art theft of the century last summer when two thieves strolled into a castle and walked out with one of the art world’s most prized works. Almost seven months have passed since Leonardo da Vinci’s “Madonna With The Yardwinder,” said to be worth around £36 million, was lifted off the wall at Drumlanrig Castle, in Dumfriesshire.

The robbers have managed to escape police around the world, with inquiries throwing up no leads to the whereabouts of the 16th-century painting. Most frustrating of all for investigators is the fact that the theft took place in front of CCTV cameras and that the getaway was captured by a tourist’s holiday snaps. The masterpiece was painted between 1500 and 1510 by Leonardo da Vinci for Florimand Robertet, the secretary of state to the King of France, Louis XII. An eyewitness account of the old master working on the painting still exists - but there have even been doubts about whether the work owned by the Duke of Buccleuch is actually the authentic masterpiece.

Several copies exist, but there is speculation that two were done by da Vinci or students of his. Globally, art theft is estimated to cost insurers £500 million a year. The database, Invaluable, in London, lists more than 100,000 stolen art and antique works. Among them are 26 Renoirs, eight Warhols, Goyas, Gainsboroughs and Rubens. While profits are high, the chance of capture and punishment is low. A recent survey by the Council for the Prevention of Art Theft, which covered a five-year period, estimated that 97 per cent of stolen artworks remain in the hands of criminals. The Art Loss Register in London has a database of 126,000 stolen items.