Theft from museums is common and nearly always an inside job, according to museum workers and experts in the recovery of stolen items.
A former long-term member of staff at a well-known London museum claimed the sector was “institutionally corrupt”, with the appropriation of certain items considered to be “fair game”.
The employee, who still works in the sector, said “cherished items” donated to the museum were sometimes quietly sold to collectors or passed to small auction houses.
“Not all people who work in museums are on the take, far from it, but it’s an unspoken problem in the sector.” The employee added they had been “shocked at what goes on”.
Their comments follow the disclosure this week that the British Museum sacked a member of staff and called in the police after it found priceless objects missing from its collection.
It is believed the items were taken over a period of time. None were on display at the museum but were among millions of objects kept in its stores.
The sacked staff member has been named as Peter Higgs, a senior curator and expert in Greek sculpture and the Hellenistic age, who worked at the British Museum for 30 years. His family has denied his involvement in any wrongdoing. The police have made no arrests.
The museum has declined to give details of the missing objects, but said they included gemstones, glassworks and gold jewellery dating from the bronze age to the 19th century.
A worker at another museum said there were few security checks on staff leaving the institution at the end of the day. “It would be easy to take something small without it being noticed for quite a while,” they said.
Arthur Brand, a Dutch investigator who has recovered stolen artefacts worth up to £340m from around the world, said: “Every museum in the world has been a victim of theft. Sometimes it’s only when they start to catalogue items that they find hundreds or even thousands are missing.
“This is nothing new – it’s been going on since the beginning of collecting. But in this case it’s the British Museum and apparently a senior collector, so it’s something special.”
Christopher Marinello of Art Recovery International said: “Museum theft is a worldwide phenomenon. But a museum is not a supermarket, they are the stewards of our cultural heritage. It shouldn’t be easy to take things.”
Museums should consider security measures such as CCTV, comprehensive cataloguing with photographic records, and vetting employees, said the experts.
“But full body searches of staff leaving the premises at the end of the day is impossible,” said Brand.
The Museums Association has published a code of ethics that does not specifically address theft of items by staff members. But a spokesperson said the principles of its code were that “museums and the people who work in them should act for the public benefit and with integrity”.
The spokesperson said: “Obviously stealing is not only a breach of law, but a breach of professional ethics. But circumstances such as what appears to have happened at the British Museum are incredibly rare.
“Most people who work in museums really love their collections. They don’t enter the profession with the intention of wrongdoing.”
The Metropolitan police’s art and antiquities unit, which investigates the theft of cultural heritage crimes in London, was staffed with four detectives and one civilian in 2022.
It maintains the London stolen arts database, containing details of stolen cultural property.
The Art Loss Register is a private global database of stolen art, antiques and collectibles. It currently lists more than 700,000 items.
