Fascinating story that was very well written. However, I think everyone got off easy, particularly the murderer.
41
Expat, Exactly.
13
@Paul in NJ I'm shocked and saddened that you can profess to be a "Christian" and get your sentence reduced. Disgusting.
30
@Moishe Pipik
Only two years each for the biggest heist in New York history and some of the jewels never found. It couldn't have anything to do with the criminals being good-looking, young white men, could it?
44
Doesn't "pulling off" a heist mean getting away with it? Busted within 48 hours, guilty of major felonies, and a brutal murderer to boot? I'm a Christian pastor, and I've got to say "finding Jesus" does not mean past despicable behavior should then be celebrated. Perhaps Mr. Murphy's conversion is legit. Good for him and those he helps if it is. Does that mean he should get out of prison 200 years early? Does that mean we should revel in a supposed "Rat-Pack-style" crime? People of color are referred to as thugs and locked up for far longer for far less or nothing at all. The Times and you, Mr. Kilgannon, can do much better than this.Terry Rae Frank and Annelle Marie Mohn were his murder victims. Maybe they should be remembered by name every time a glitzy, hipster article about Mr. Murphy is published?
80
@Corey Keyes, I agree - I see nothing to celebrate here. The only heroes are the cops and the prosecutor.
The two women Murphy murdered - Terry Rae Frank and Annelle Marie Mohn - are treated as mere minor footnotes in this story - not as two human lives he snuffed out.
Very disappointed with the NY Times for this fluff piece.
23
Very well written. This article alone makes the cost of having the Sunday paper tossed in my driveway well worth the expense.
16
Great story! In the back of my mind when I am reading it Im thinking how simple this heist was and how terribly complicated crimes are today.
9
I was 14 and remember this event like it was yesterday. The story dominated the news. In part becuase it was a fun story, there was no murder, no pain just an exotic jewel stolen. In the trump era this was a refreshing read!
17
Murph the surf paid his dues, and is a very generous man now. He will let you buy him a pizza, and has his named inscribed in a brick at a world famous golf resort in central Florida.
5
And Roger Clark was a great person too...knew him well during VT days. everyone paid their dues...the merry pranksters...no violence...the perfect wave.
8
I remember this, I was young and impressionable....my father was furious and said to me these idiots were giving our good name a blemish. Now as a man, and re reading these accounts, I see that he was right. I would use stronger words to describe these idiots, but for some unknown reason our society still embraces idiots...their brash manner towards justice and flaunting their crime is typically a characteristic of spoiled children. Shame they didn’t spend longer in jail.
12
I wonder if Beach Boy stalwart Brian Wilson had this caper in mind when he wrote his timeless classic Heroes and Villains?
5
So not all the stolen jewels were recovered? A tantalizing coda to this story...
33
Thanks for a great story!
17
Middle-aging surfers might appeal to a 19-year-old, but the “brains” and misplaced confidence described here on both sides of the caper explain the not so glamorous outcome.
8
There is nothing special about these thieves. They got caught. A good thief remains anonymous and free. Lots of lawyers and bankers understand this. So do some husbands and wives.
The same applies to murderers and other criminals.
Rule 1 - Always be totally anonymous
Rule 2 - Never admit to anything and never speak to the press
Rule 3 - Be conservative in your appearance and manner.
Rule 4 - Operate legally and quietly. Don't boast. Or get drunk.
Rule 5 - Retire quietly
Rule 6 - Know the above rules and abide by them.
34
@Jack Frost
But...what if you live in a state where murder or theft are not legal? I'm not sure I could adhere to Rule 3, at least not in Pennsylvania. But the other rules...piece of cake.
7
Oops, I meant Rule 4. Argh, that's what happens when you try to be funny.
26
@Jack Frost. So Jack are these rules personal for you? Do you maybe have a tale to tell? Maybe something you would like to get off your chest or share?
15
A real New York caper. thanks Corey.
12
When my laptop was stolen from my house, the cop asked if I had home insurance, which I did. He put away his notebook and said, "then you didn't lose anything. That's why you have insurance."
18
Of course they got caught. Who buttons both buttons on a blazer. Allan should have known better.
45
@wfriedm Well-played, sir.
5
Great story. When I finally get to New York, the Natural History Museum will be among my 1st stops.
30
@Joann, you will love it!
7
It's funny: I was just at the Natural History Museum a couple of weeks ago with my five-year-old son. He loves to go there, and we make the trip across Central Park regularly. We got to talking with one of the guards about when the Hall of Gems renovations might be done, and he told us the story of Murf the Surf, which I'd never heard. And lo and behold, here's the same story in the NYTimes. Now I have the whole story. Pretty interesting.
My son still prefers the dinosaurs.
59
Growing up in South Florida in the early 60's was a heady experience. We went from the Bay of Pigs in '61 to three successive autumnal events: the Cuban missile Crisis in '62, the JFK assassination in '63, and Murph the Surf's caper in '64. Percolating throughout the years were the ascendance of Cassius Clay and the escapades of the Miami Mob bosses. The nuns who taught our Catechism classes were easily distracted from the Sacraments and convinced that the country had lost its mind. Prayer followed accordingly.
Experiencing those times turned out to be a good way to prepare for coming to grips with the current moment.
55
@Mortiser -"The nuns who taught our Catechism classes were easily distracted from the Sacraments and convinced that the country had lost its mind. Prayer followed accordingly."- Great comment.
22
Yeah, but who stole these jewels and from whom in the first place???
61
One of the most accurate accounts of Murf the Surf; great reporting. I've worked with Jack for over 30 years. His redemptive story is amazing. He has been ministering to prisoners for 30 plus years and helping with prison reform at his personal expense. The real issue for critics is, do they believe a man can change. Jack has changed.
29
@Domenic
This is ONLY an accurate account of ONE of his crimes, NOT of him.
It can't be an accurate account of the man without full stories of the Whiskey Creek murders of Terrie Rae Frank and Annelle Marie Mohn, plus the robbery at gunpoint of Olive Wofford which included the threat of burning her 8-year old niece with boiling water.
I believe a person can change. I'm willing to believe Murphy has reformed. Lots of criminals reform.
They're still in prison.
Murphy is out not because he reformed, but because he is silver-tongued, handsome, "cool", and he has celebrity connections. This is UNequal justice under law, which has another name:
Injustice.
97
@Domenic
It never amazes me how some guileless people can easily fall for silver-tongued con man invoking God's name.
18
@TS, Murphy is also white - no doubt that helped too.
What's particularly galling is that the murder of two women and the armed robbery of a third in which he threatened to burn a child, were treated as minor offenses.
22
My Mother followed this story religiously. She loved that name "Murph the Surf." It is good to learn what actually happened and what happened after all the events that were reported.
8
I can't believe they had very light sentences. Mr. Murphy should still be in jail for the heist and the murders.
25
Why would anybody take something that doesn't belong to them?
6
@Aaron Please ask the man you voted for, Donald Trump. He has a good answer.
7
The story is written like it was a Donald Westlake caper novel, with Murphy as Dortmunder. The reality is quite otherwise; in today's world these guys would be Mexican drug lords and the movie would feature narcos corridos as the theme music. Criminal behavior should never be lionized.
22
for the life of me, I don't understand why many people find these criminals to be some kind of folk hero. As if stealing is some kind of laudable act. Especially in what is an overwhelmingly Christian nation. I wonder if those people who cheer for Bonnie & Clyde types would feel if it were they who were robbed and murdered.
38
@Dave
I don't disagree with your basic point, but it seems to have always been an element of human culture, long predating and including Christianity, to tell stories of rule-breakers. Christ himself was executed with 2 other criminals and told them they would dine at the Lord's table that night.
But in the here-and-now, I think an important and overlooked question is: what actions cause the most harm? In terms of property crimes, wage theft losses far exceed all other property crimes put together. In terms of lives lost, our drug-lords of the Fortune 500 kill 10s of thousands every year.
Whether our nation is Christian is debatable, but it is certainly a Capitalist nation, and we reward and cheer for the rich regardless of who they had to kill or steal from. Next year's election will give us a chance to replace a big-time wage-thief with a financial crimes prosecutor as our leader. Choose wisely if you love your nation.
40
Quite a story. I used to live off Columbus Avenue and 74th street only a few blocks away from the museum, and during the late '50's and early '60's used to wander as a teenager through its exotic exhibits spanning several floors. I'm certain that I must have come across the Star of India and other jewel exhibits, although what really excited me at the time were the giant Olmec and Toltec stone heads depicting Mesoamerican civilizations. One of our most cherished memories of living in the Big Apple.
24
@Rafael Gonzalez Me too, Rafael. I was born in Central Park West Hospital one block from the museum and marveled at the amazing (FREE) museum's 47 dioramas, the mayan sacrificial stone, the mummified Peruvian copper miners, the suspended whale, and the precious items in the Hall of Gems. I also vividly remember those giant double-hung windows not 40 feet away from the flat display cases. In summer, they were wide open. I won't say what thoughts went through my teenage mind, but it had something to do with why we take delight in something that is criminal and not worthy: adventure. It is not always worthy, but it is exciting.
4
I lived on the Jersey Shore in high school when all of this went down. My surfer buddies and I loved the nickname, "Murph the Surf." It was impossibly cool at a time when the Beach Boys still were on the charts.
We went on a field trip to the Museum Of Natural History before the heist and saw all these stones in their cases. That made the caper that much more wild and crazy to us. Then you add in surfers as the culprits and the newspapers went wild with it.
Thanks a million for this story. Man, has it ever opened up a can of memories.
32
In the 1960s I visited the Cairo Museum, repository of the King Tut materials that later showed up in one of the early blockbuster exhibits at the Metropolitan Museum.
At the Cairo Museum attendance was sparse during the blazing hot summer I was there, and I had the many galleries pretty much to myself aside from one or two sleepy guards who rarely left the chairs where they sat. It did cross my mind how easy it would have been to plunder one or two display cases because these were the days before video surveillance and alarm-wired exhibit cases; however, not being of the Murph-the-Surf persuasion I of course ignored the temptation.
Note to readers: The Cairo Museum and other similar sites in Egypt now have modern security and alarm systems, so the opportunity to make a big score has long since passed.
I do hope the NYT will devote similar reporting resources and ink to covering the anniversary of the many contributions the American Museum of Natural History has made to the understanding and preservation of the natural world and its many cultures.
72
@monray
I remember going to the King Tut exhibit, and while we were waiting in line in freezing snow my mother talking about seeing it in Cairo in the - ‘50s? Maybe ‘60s. She told us lots of it was on foldout tables, and you could pick up the pieces and look at them. Things certainly have changed!
9
Wow, what a great story! I had no idea about any of this ... which I suppose isn't surprising since I'm nowhere near New York and was born 32 years after it happened.
It's an interesting study in perception, too. Of course stealing is wrong - but I still found myself ... not cheering for, but at least kind of liking these guys (the picture of Allan Kuhn from the time of the heist certainly didn't hurt!) when all they did was steal gems. Then at the end I read that Jack Murphy murdered two women and in an instant he went from rebellious rogue to monster in my mind. He should still be in prison.
70
Reading this article now, am as irritated as the Mr. Nadjari the prosecutor was then. The article seems to be extremely positive towards the thieves. Oh, yes not low lives idiots with long history of crimes. Oh, yes they were white and young, and elegant. The article starts saying they became “folk heroes” that really tells how society sees color and crime.
47
@RBR, Exactly - nothing heroic about career criminals, especially since one is also a murderer.
11
Zaza Gabor was in Green Acres, not her sister Eva.
6
@Adam K: It was Eva Gabor, per Wikipedia and IMDB.
13
@Adam K no Eva Gabor was in green acres!
10
@Adam K Nope - it was Eva. People think of Zsa Zsa as being the ditzy one, and naturally associate that role with her. But it was Eva - the elegant one - who played the ditzy ex-urban farmwife. They both had extensive, if not celebrated, film and TV careers.
11
Maybe The Star of India should be returned to Sri Lanka where a member of an internationally operating gang of gentlemen thieves called the British Army got hold of it.
120
Great thieves get a lot of respect and leniency. And these men also get a lot of attention from women, who then have children with them. So we all descend from such people. The current events underscore this age-old tendency. This is why democracy and justice don't work very well.
7
Movie time....
6
Hmm, what would "The Big Kahuna" think of this?? What goes around, comes around?
1
Time for a remake
6
The museum learned much from this. Unfortunately, the Gardner Museum in Boston did not until the big heist nearly 30 years later.
27
Murph should still be in prison, if not executed, for his crimes of violence and murder. Amazing and contemptible that his jewel thefts gave him the cachet to get out of jail.
Watching Point Break, I was very much more taken with the romance of being a bank robber/beach bum than an FBI agent, except for Keanu's great run across the sky.
Just another example of the lack of punishment in the US. No wonder we had a guy imprisoned in Korea for stealing a poster. He probably couldn't conceive of being punished for such a thing. And that athlete who stole an expensive watch in China, I think it was. Our young think anything goes.
15
Now do the right thing and return the Star of India to India.
21
I always liked thief stories. Not that I could be a thief mostly because it's more satisfying to pay for things with money I earned. So why didn't I enjoy this piece more than I did? Murphy carried a gun. Did he always carry one, even when he robbed Eva Gabor? Just in case of what? Some security guard doing his rounds shows up? That's one Kool Kat? He also brutally murdered two women which this piece brushes aside as a factoid that in the way of his celebrity-hood. He's not a thief. He's a murderer.
Not based on personal experience but I understand if someone want's to avoid trouble in prison is to act religious or mentally ill. Outreach program, how does anyone believe it as a sign of reform?
17
@JoeG, Yes, the fact that he carried a gun to the museum theft shows he was ready to kill someone. And later, he did murder two women - which as you point out, is treated a minor side note.
5
Det. McNally looks exactly like one would imagine an NYPD detective of the era would look.
A fine article, but I'd rather it had skewed more to the side of McNally and Nadjari vs. the crooks, despite the fact that they were more handsome.
13
The photo of Kuhn and Murphy being landed at JFK. Freewheeling surf dudes in their twenties. They look a lot older than that! Being young looked different in those far off days. Great article, well written but please no movie. Its been done to death already. Let it be.
5
@Lenny I agree . . . there is something almost weird about how old these "young people" looked. When you look at photos of servicemen in World War II. even though you know most of them are "under 20" they all look as if they're in their early 40s.
There is something about black and white photography that does that . . . either that or all these men were somehow prematurely aged.
8
@Nick
I don't think it has anything to do with black and white photography. In those post war decades - up to may be mid 60's - most young people, once they finished college or started working, dressed like their parents did. Basically they all looked "grown up" then, unlike these days where almost everyone dresses like they are still teenagers, way into their 30's and 40's.
7
They look older because they were -- they were grownups. Most of the men served in World War II.
Today our young people look young because they tend not to be grownups. Most of them do not serve and would wriggle out of serving if there were a draft.
2
Murph the Surf. He was not exactly Robin Hood. A violent criminal, he never should have been released on parole. Good to see my old friend McNally still looking good.
26
Years after the Star of India case, Murph the Surf was convicted of the Whiskey Creek murders of two young women, which was the subject of a great novel called Et Tu Brady by Joseph Collum .
14
While reading this story, I get the strange feeling that these surfer dudes are being glorified!!! I do not see what is so great about stealing something of such great value, that was donated, for the public to enjoy. Also, not to come across as racist (which, I am not), but if this article were about a group of young men, that were not white, they would not have any “swagger”, they would not be glorified, they would be vilified!!!
I see this story two ways: historically educational (because this occurred when I was a child), and glorifying a group of white young men that committed a crime against the public.
24
Why anyone would wax romantic about criminals who steal and do harm to others? I would be willing to wager that a movie influenced these rouge wannabes. Hitchcock's " To Catch A Thief", one of my top flick's, starring a very suave , and funny actor, the great Cary Grant alongside the very talented Grace Kelley. ...... These "surfers" would have been smitten by the movie and also The Great Train Robbery of 1963?
5
@Tony, the Cary Grant character in " To Catch A Thief" was not a murderer and did not carry a gun. It WAS a movie.
As for these real criminals: they were low-life career criminals - including one who was a murderer. If they were anything other than white, they would have been described as thugs and predators and no one would see them as "folk heroes."
7
Good story...I am also a longboarder..perhaps one day we can catch a few waves. Good luck..
1
What a memory - tho' I lived a couple hundred miles away as a kid, my mother used to buy the Daily News every day - from which I absorbed a lot about politics, fame and fortune in the City - - - and I remembered Murph the Surf the minute I saw the title. But it turns out that the suave jewel thief was a murderer? He wasn't exactly Robin Hood?
11
So...what happened to the gems that were NOT found. Almost half? Inquiring minds....
15
What a blast from the past. My first exposure to heist films in 1964 was Topkapi. This might have been the first of the genre (search “heist film” on Wikipedia, you’ll see there’s hundreds since cinema was invented) with an extended sequence characterized by total silence and extended creative derring-do, creating intense suspense. From that film through Ocean’s Whatever, the formula still works and a great heist film is fun to watch. There are sub genres where no one gets hurt and the thieves get away clean, to those with violent shootouts and car crashes and “crime never pays off” moral. Maybe I’ll search for Topkapi online and watch it again. Take my mind off the modern heist film that is Trump’s government playing every day on your favorite cable T V station.
19
@Peter
"Topkapi" was preceded, by nine years, by "Rififi," truly the grandaddy of all heist films, and made in France by the same director, Jules Dassin. He used the same technique for the brilliant 32-minute wordless heist scene in the earlier film. Brian De Palma, who apparently has never had an original idea of his own, imitated the "Topkapi" scene in "Mission: Impossible," when Tom Cruise lowered himself into the CIA computer room. Dassin was born in Connecticut and grew up in New York, where he filmed "The Naked City," with its climactic chase on the Williamsburg Bridge. He was blacklisted but overcame that with "Topkapi" and "Never on Sunday," both starring Melina Mercouri, whom he later married.
17
I grew up in NYC, and lived not too far from the Museum at the time. I remember my parents and their friends talking about the crime, and then the movie Topkapi came out around the same time.
4
Though I am not that young, this event was before my time. Thanks for a great story
6
I remember this so well. I was in third grade at PS 87, right around the corner from The Museum of Natural History.
My parents -- avid readers of the New York Times -- talked about the story all the time.
As is typical of a child I did not realize it was a national story. For me, it was merely more news about my neighborhood.
16
Pictures of those not recovered? A little hope for return would have been nice even if a long shot.
22
@poslug: A history of the Eagle diamond and some photos are here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagle_Diamond
5
@poslug - I'll have to check my jewelry box. You never know.
2
Murphy got one of his life sentences for the murder of one of two young women found shot, bludgeoned, and decomposing after being sunk to the bottom of a creek off the beach south of Fort Lauderdale. That, not some madcap jewel heist, was the big crime story in my Jr. High years nearby.
I was very surprised to find he wasn't either dead or still in prison, but had been paroled and released in 1986 after serving less than 20 years. Originally, his earliest parole date was apparently to have been 2225, so he was paroled 239 years early. Per Wikipedia, this charismatic, athletic murderer was paroled after modeling himself after three charismatic professional athletes who came to his prison to witness for Christ.
I'm willing to accept that he has sincerely turned his life around and is worthy of release.
I am certain, though, that vast numbers of equally reformed and worthy people are still in prison because the parole board didn't find them charismatic enough and they had no athletic connections.
Murphy's freedom renders the sentences they are still serving an injustice.
160
Jack has helped get many prisoners out of jail/prison over the 33 plus years he has been ministering.
1
Cue modern movie starring Keanu Reeves Jr., etc...it has all the winning ingredients!
7
@Sam I think it was called Point Break with Keanu and Swayze.
1
My husband grew up on Miami Beach in that era and yes, Murph the Surf WAS a "folk hero".....
The Donald would applaud him and his friends and agree with them that the detective was insane for passing up wealth for honesty.
51
One of my aunt's was robbed by Murph the Surf in Miami. I never knew he was still alive.
51
The SW corner of the museum is at 77th and Columbus. Is Mr. Kilgannon not from NYC?
2
The SW corner is at 77th St. The truck entrance is up Columbus near 78th St. The car could be parked at the corner and the thieves walk up the avenue.
10
I am wondering: Would the results have been the same if they had been all black?
Malcom X was once a thief and found redemption, though as a Muslim.
58
Murph should still be in prison, whether he found Jesus, Muhammad, Buddha, Krishna or the Old Testament prophets.
126
@Akhenaton :
people ARE paroled from prison all the time.....I have no idea why, other than his prison ministry, he was paroled, but he had already spent years there.
3
@Akhenaton Evidently Jesus 'saves' if one is white.
19
I must admit, I had my eye on one of the eggs at the Fabergé Museum in St. Petersburg last month but, I checked, and the batteries to the trip wire were NOT corroded.
37
@TritonPSH
Well-played, sir.
1
This is a great story! Thank you for taking us back to a time of innocence and naïveté.
15
Who needs Hollywood?
25
Cowabunga! Great story. Never knew about Murph’s criminal side.
13
Haven't read this yet, but the title appears to glorify theft .
14
@Yeppers, it does. Just a bare mention of the fact that "Murph" later murdered two young women.
5
The Times should not publish articles like this that, to some, glorify crime.
28
Talk about white privilege. Here's a story gushing about criminals because they fit some white surfer archetype ideal whereas black kids get thrown in prison for petty drug crimes and black women get shot in their own homes while playing video games for the high crime of leaving a door open and legally owning a gun. Even the fact that the person arrested for involvement in a double murder got a redemption story sticks out as odd. It's disgraceful that the NYT didn't even acknowledge this context. This story isn't cute; it's grossly enamored of a double standard.
199
@Jarrod Lipshy It was a major crime that cost taxpayers million of dollars!
20
@Jarrod Lipshy So true. The Cyrus family with their vault full of reefer while entire communities have been destroyed over the decades by three strike laws. Born again Murphy managed to get out and kill several women to boot. I bet you he and Jesus have a lot to talk about. Poor Jesus.
30
@Jarrod Lipshy :
You are correct, but these crimes occurred over 50 years ago, and things were different then. Not making excuses, just being factual.
22
Murphy in the last picture looks like Joey Bishop.
7
@Benito hmmm. Never seen a picture of those two together. You thinking what I’m thinking?
2
Cowabunga!
2
I fear a movie will come. With the ageless Matt Damon and Leonardo di Caprio as two of the surfer thieves. Hollywood can't ignore an obvious money maker.
13
@Arturo Eff ....Already did many versions : "Point Break" comes to mind as well as a film based on this very crime mentioned in the article.
10
@Arturo Eff
Let's not glorify these thieves and murderers more than they've already been.
2
The Star of India is a huge, blue, star sapphire weighing 563.35 carats. It is cut as a cabochon. A British Army officer brought it to London, where it was cut by Albert Ramsay around 1905.
Interesting how so much of the world’s treasures wound up in the hands of the British.
21
@Chris
Truly. For centuries, their navy ruled & they grabbed whatever they could. Depending on the era, so did Spain, France, America & many others. Look at China today: By 2050, They will "own" more land & people than any other country. That"s a bet, my friend.
14
@Chris The Brits will probably be selling those treasures to make ends meet after Brexit.
11
@Chris if you go to the British Museum in London, you will see the beautiful carved marbles they took from the Parthenon, a temple in Greece. It is staggering to see all the loot taken from all over the world. The famous Kohinoor diamond, originally from India is in a crown stored in the Tower of London. The spoils of war and empire, likely never to be returned.
11
Good story! Fun read!
14
MR. Murphy, MR. Kuhn, MR. Clark!? Why to special treatment for career crooks? Looks as if the author was buying into the trend to make crooks into rogue heroes.
Otherwise, well-told story.
6
@Destravlr No special treatment here. It is the Times' policy to use the courtesy title with all persons in all stories (unless, of course, they have an official title).
21
@Destravlr That is proper journalism. Heck, they even call the President Mr. Trump when other names would better suit.
39
@Destravlr the NYT always refers to people as "Mr., Ms." Nothing new with this.
17
See, I read the Times because buried in articles like these.....I find things that I would not have known. Because of reading the piece, am currently listening to Shorty Rogers, who Murph saw perform very shortly after the heist. Don't care about the gems, people; care about the jazz.
78
@Dana
I agree - Shorty Rogers is the gem in this well reported story.
4
Great story, Corey!
8
Whiteness on display, shining as brightly as the stolen gems.
45
@Taryn Hallweaver Such a silly comment.
4
@Geno To the contrary, I believe her point is well taken. The rogue, handsome, seductive, white criminals who are perceived as rehabilitative. Steal iconic gems and commit murder then "retire" in Florida. This takes a bit more than charisma.
14
@Geno, Taryn is right. No way these criminals - especially Murphy, who was also a murderer - would have been "folk heroes" if they were anything but white.
Can you imagine if Murphy were black and displayed the same arrogance? He probably would have gotten the death penalty for the murders.
10
Great read!
7
Compared to what Donald and his father stole in 1964, this crime
was petty and juvenile.
31
@A. Stanton Yes, indeed but as awful as the Trumps are I don't believe they ever killed anymore with their own bare hands. Certainly destroyed lives and ConDon's foreign policy has a body count but just sayin'
6
@Lisa :
so far as we know, but is he blameless for the deaths of Kurdish children, women and men living in their own land and hurting no one? I think so.
20
Loved the line that Murph the Surf didn’t want to get caught looking like a schlub! That’s a classy thief!
26
Very cool story, thanks for sharing!
26
What a great story. Nadjeri is the true selfless folk hero, looking out for the people of New York.
101
@Jenny K In the 1960s I visited the Cairo Museum, repository of the King Tut materials that later showed up in one of the early blockbuster exhibits at the Metropolitan Museum.
At the Cairo Museum attendance was sparse during the blazing hot summer I was there, and I had the many galleries pretty much to myself aside from one or two sleepy guards who rarely left the chairs where they sat. It did cross my mind how easy it would have been to plunder one or two display cases because these were the days before video surveillance and alarm-wired exhibit cases; however, not being of the Murph-the-Surf persuasion I of course ignored the temptation.
Note to readers: The Cairo Museum and other similar sites in Egypt now have modern security and alarm systems, so the opportunity to make a big score has long since passed.
I do hope the NYT will devote similar reporting resources and ink to covering the anniversary of the many contributions the American Museum of Natural History has made to the understanding and preservation of the natural world and its many cultures.
5
This sounds almost identical to the plot of the brilliant 1991 film by Kathryn Bigelow, "Point Break". Starring Keanu Reeves, Patrick Swayze, Gary Busey and (my fave) Lori Petty, I believe it will become (if not already) a true "cult classic". Please note: I use that term sparingly, as it is so very overused.
11
@Easy Goer Point Break has a strong standing as a cult classic. As a kid growing up in California, I had a big cartoon decal of "Murph the Surf" on my bedroom window. It would be a couple of decades before I and other surfers would hear about his other life as a gem thief, reading it in the pages of surf magazines.
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@jbinsb
Agreed about the cult status (you read it). How very cool you grew up there & could surf. Also you read about the gem heists. Awesome, my friend. I admire & envy your chance to surf. I'm an East coast guy; most of my life in NYC. I had a Jamaican dude who surfed in the Rockaways. Not like your Mavericks or Hawaii, but he had the passion. Peace, my friend.
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Correction: My Jamaican friend "worked" for my company in Manhattan, NYC, NY. Considering we were a small business with only 25 people, he worked alongside a "family" of many diverse cultures. Friends from Amsterdam, NL; Medellin, CO; Rio de Janeiro, BR; Madrid, ES; Capetown, SA; Paris, FR; Buenos Aires, AR; London, GB; etc. For me, the true beauty of New York City is it's diversity. According to "Ithaka S & R" (a research & consulting service), there are over 1000 cultural organizations, each with specific ties to communities, each with vastly different organizational structures & sizes, & each integral to the diversity of culture that defines New York City.
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Thank you for such a great story. I did not know about this heist until just now.
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