Angela Catherine Hamblin, Selling Counterfeit Art, New York 2007

Angela Catherine Hamblin, a 74-year-old citizen of the United Kingdom, has been extradited from Germany to face justice in the United States for her role in a scheme to sell counterfeit works of art.

According to U.S. Attorney Damian Williams, Hamblin engaged in a fraudulent scheme to sell at least four paintings that she represented to be works of renowned artists such as Joseph Mallord William Turner, Milton Avery, Franz Kline, and Juan Gris.

Hamblin made various claims about where she acquired the paintings, including that she or her husband had inherited them from relatives and that they purchased one of the paintings from a then-deceased seller.

The scheme was uncovered in 2007, and Hamblin was subsequently charged with two counts of mail fraud and one count of wire fraud. She pleaded guilty on February 16, 2009, and was sentenced to one year and one day in prison.

However, Hamblin failed to report to U.S. prison authorities as ordered and instead fled the United States to the United Kingdom. She was re-arrested on May 31, 2022, while changing planes at an airport in Frankfurt, Germany.

Hamblin was extradited from Germany to the United States and transported to the custody of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons to serve her prison sentence. The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Art Crime Team/New York Major Theft Task Force and the Justice Department's Office of International Affairs assisted in the extradition.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams praised the investigative work of the FBI and thanked German authorities for their assistance in Hamblin's extradition.

The case is being handled by the Office's Complex Frauds and Cybercrime Unit, with Assistant U.S. Attorney David Raymond Lewis in charge of the prosecution.

Hamblin's sentence will be served at a federal prison in the United States, marking the end of her 13-year stint as a fugitive.

Source: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/seller-counterfeit-art-extradited-germany-after-13-years-fugitive