Ornament thieves plague posh neighborhood

[TexasStooge]

NAPLES, Fla. (Court TV) — Lock your gates and bolt down your life-sized bronze alligators.

That's what police are telling residents of the exclusive Port Royal neighborhood, where a bandit has been prowling the posh locale and lifting thousand-dollar lawn ornaments.

The case is still under investigation, according to Naples police.

The thief or thieves have lugged away eight statues, including a bronze alligator and a ballerina, since mid-July. The suspects went on a September stealing spree, swiping four statues in an 11-day span, police said. Three of them reportedly came from the same $8.2 million estate belonging to Wanda Polisseni.

In August, the lawn-ornament bandit hit the Polisseni mansion for a $4,800 bronze girl on a swing. Then in September, someone snagged $3,500 worth of bronze toucans from the front-yard sculpture garden. The next day, the $3,000 statue of children climbing a ladder was gone.

Experts are hesitant to call the bandit an art thief, since the pieces in question are mass-produced and have little value on the black market as art. For example, a $20,000 bronze sculpture may have $1,000 worth of metal in it.

Still, it's a more valuable than a garden-variety pink flamingo ornament.

[therock1811]

I hope they bust them!!!!!!!!

[Amanzi]

I hope they get them too!!

A few streets down from me, there is a guy who makes the most amazing drift wood sculptures (they are massive things) One of them was stolen not so long ago. He leaves them on display outside his studio in the garden, I see now he has chained them into the ground.