From the Montreal police to the burgled art museum, from Canadian Heritage to the Quebec Department of Culture, mum is the word in the Skylight Capper.
	It was the early morning hours of September 4, 1972, when three men fell from a skylight down a nylon rope on the second floor of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.  They had chosen the one skylight for which the alarm had not been set, and once inside, the armed trio quickly overpowered the few overnight museum guards.
	Blindfolded, gagged and bound in a first-floor lecture hall, the guards could only give the most basic descriptions – the two men they actually saw were of average height and build, wore ski masks and had long hair.  Two of the thieves spoke French and one spoke English.  A large chunk of the city’s male population could fit the description.
	Not surprisingly, the case quickly faded from memory, as Labor Day weekend 1972 was a particularly busy one.  On Friday, September 1, three men who were denied entry to Montreal’s Wagon Wheel, a country and western bar, set fire to a back staircase.  The fire eventually consumed the entire building, killing 37 people.
	The following day Canada lost the opening game of the 1972 Summit Series to the Soviet Union at the Montreal Forum.
	And when news of the Skylight Caper began to hit the national news wires, international attention had been drawn to the unfolding hostage crisis at the Munich Olympics, which would soon degenerate into one of the most horrific acts of terrorism the world had ever seen.
	To this day, the Montreal theft – which Canadian Art magazine in 2019 called the largest in the country’s history – remains extremely unclear.
	For about half an hour the trio selects the paintings, trinkets and jewelry they intend to steal.  Evidence from the scene suggested to investigators that the thieves attempted to set up a pulley system to transport themselves and the valuable art and objects they had stolen, behind the skylight.  Later reports of the theft indicated that the thieves abandoned their original pulley plan and opted to use the museum’s van instead.
	One of the thieves accidentally set off the alarm on a side door that led out onto the street, eliminating the suspicion that it was an inside job. 
	Investigators later determined that the thieves panicked, grabbed what they could carry — 18 paintings and 39 small objects — and took off on foot.  Among the stolen items were paintings by Delacroix, Jan Bruegel the Elder, Millet, Rubens and Rembrandt.
	What was left behind was even more amazing: masterpieces by Goya, El Greco, Picasso, a Renoir and another Rembrandt. 
	Police later concluded that what connected the stolen pieces was their size — they were all small enough to be easily stacked together. 
	At the time, the museum estimated it had lost $2 million in stolen property — nearly $14 million in today’s dollars.  Later estimates showed that only Rembrandt could be worth so much.
	Only two of the stolen items have ever been recovered — a locket and a painting attributed to Jan Bruegel the Elder — both during failed ransom attempts.
	As the 50th anniversary approached, the Montreal Police Department was asked to comment on the unsolved mystery.  Spokeswoman Anik de Repentigny said the case was still considered open and had no further comment. 
	But longtime art crime investigator and retired Montreal police detective Alain Lacoursière — a man whose talent for solving art crimes earned him the nickname the Columbo of art — doesn’t think Montreal police are actively investigating the theft because no one is not familiar with file. 
	Lacoursière has also previously stated in both the Journal of Art Crime and Canadian Art that he believes the investigation was flawed from the start, allegations that the files were mishandled and investigators gave up too soon.
	Although the museum’s media relations department assembled a collection of files on the case, they were reluctant to discuss it in depth.  The theft is for all intents and purposes a cold case, the paintings and objects are now the stolen property of the insurer and the case dealt an embarrassing blow to the museum’s prestige and collection.
	“Theft of any work of art is a tragedy, as it deprives society of the benefits of art and knowledge,” Maude Béland, the museum’s media relations manager, said in an email.  “Of course, we’d love to have them back!  Unfortunately, we have no new information.”
	When contacted by The Canadian Press for comment on the anniversary of the theft, spokespeople at three levels of government declined comment.
	The Skylight Caper is unique among high-profile art thefts in that the paintings have gone up and down in value.  After the Brueghel was returned unscathed in a show of good faith during the ransom negotiations, it was re-evaluated by a prominent art historian and deemed unlikely to have been painted by the great master.
	Subsequent examination of the museum’s records regarding the stolen paintings, as reported in the Journal of Art Crime in 2011, revealed that doubts had been raised about the authenticity and/or attribution of approximately seven paintings, in some cases dating back six years. robbery.  .  Adding insult to injury, a Rubens purchased by the museum with the insurance payment was also later found to be misattributed. 
	What seemed like the biggest break in the case came some 30 years after the robbery at a small art gallery in Montreal’s east end.  Lacoursière struck up a conversation with a man he would later nickname Smith, who seemed to know everything about the case, including details not commonly known to the public.
	The man was an avid art collector, independently wealthy, and an art student in Montreal in 1972. “Smith” indicated that he may have been part of a group of art students the Montreal police suspected in the weeks following the theft. 
	Lacoursière showed up at the man’s house at one point and asked him—perhaps hoping to throw him off—where in his yard they should start digging.  “Smith” just laughed.
	Lacoursière says the man he named Smith died in 2017 or 2018. 
	“He was certainly well aware of the details of the theft,” Lacoursière said in an email exchange, “but I think it was either from newspapers or friends.”
	The retired detective spent much of his career investigating the case, but still has no clear idea of ​​what happened to the paintings other than hoping they’re still out there somewhere. 
	This report by The Canadian Press was first published on September 4, 2022.