Thieves sold £1/2m Henry Moore sculpture for scrap
TWO scrap metal thieves who sold a £500,000 sculpture by Henry Moore for £46 were branded ‘selfish’ and jailed for a year yesterday.
Liam Hughes, 22, and Jason Parker, 19, snatched the piece called Sundial from the grounds of the Henry Moore Foundation.
They had no idea of the true value of the work, St Albans Crown Court was told.
The pair also stole a bronze plinth from an adjacent work at the foundation in Much Hadham, Hertfordshire.
Hughes and Parker took the haul to a scrap metal dealer.
They got just £182.60 for the plinth and only £46 for Sundial.
The scrap dealer was going to give the sculpture to his mother before the thefts featured on BBC Crimewatch.
He alerted police and Hughes and Parker, both of Stansted, Essex, were arrested. Both items were recovered. They admitted theft last month.
These were utterly selfish thefts
Judge Marie Catterson told them: “These were utterly selfish thefts.”
