The Accidental Picasso Thief: The True Story of a Reverse Heist, Outrunning the FBI, and Fleeing the Boston Mob

Author:   Whit Rummel, Jr. (WITCOM Associates) ,  Noah Charney (Art historian, author)
Publisher:   Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
ISBN:  

9798765188262


Pages:   168
Publication Date:   22 January 2026
Format:   Hardback
Availability:   Not yet available   Availability explained
This item is yet to be released. You can pre-order this item and we will dispatch it to you upon its release.

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The Accidental Picasso Thief: The True Story of a Reverse Heist, Outrunning the FBI, and Fleeing the Boston Mob


Overview

In 1969, during a Boston snowstorm, a crate containing Pablo Picasso’s Portrait of a Woman and a Musketeer vanished from Logan Airport. It should have gone to a Milwaukee gallery—but instead ended up in the closet of Bill Rummel, a young forklift operator. What followed was a stranger-than-fiction chain of events: FBI agents on the hunt, whispers of Whitey Bulger’s mob, and a daring “reverse heist” devised by Bill’s father to secretly return the painting. But the mystery didn’t end there. After its return, the Picasso disappeared again—vanishing into private hands, unseen by the public for more than fifty years. Part true crime, part memoir, The Accidental Picasso Thief uncovers the Rummel family’s incredible brush with art history, crime, and secrecy—and one man’s decades-long search for a lost masterpiece.

Full Product Details

Author:   Whit Rummel, Jr. (WITCOM Associates) ,  Noah Charney (Art historian, author)
Publisher:   Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Imprint:   Bloomsbury Academic
ISBN:  

9798765188262


Pages:   168
Publication Date:   22 January 2026
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Forthcoming
Availability:   Not yet available   Availability explained
This item is yet to be released. You can pre-order this item and we will dispatch it to you upon its release.

Table of Contents

Introduction Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Bibliography

Reviews

Narrated in rollicking fashion. * Booklist *


Author Information

Whit Rummel Jr. is a filmmaker with a Master's in Film from Boston University. His first documentary, TATTOO, aired nationally on PBS. His first screenplay, Secret Boy, won the Nicholl Fellowship from The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He established WITCOM Associates, a Boston-based production house. Noah Charney is an art historian, author of The Art Thief, and founder of the Association for Research into Crimes against Art, a non-profit focused on art crime prevention. Publications such as the New York Times, Italy's Ventiquattro, and TIME have written about him, and he has appeared on NPR, MSNBC, and CNBC.

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Latest Reading Guide

NOV RG 20252

 

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