Gail Ellis

Master Forgers: the Greenhalgh Family: Does Crime Really Pay? Gail Ellis

On the 16th November, 2007, George, his wife Olive and their Son Shaun stood before the judge and confessed to conspiring to defraud museums and private collectors during their eighteen year span and laundering the money that they had made from their criminal acts. Shaun Greenhalgh aged 47 and the leader was jailed for four years eight months and his mother Olive aged 82 received a 12 month sentence suspended for two years for her role in the swindle. George Greenhalgh aged 84 received a 12 month suspended sentence mainly due to his age sentence and after medical tests were undertaken. Much disagreement surrounds this case as many people believe the sentences did not reflect the enormity of their crimes. The family were said to have made millions from their crimes and bank statements showed that they had made at least £850,000. The police believe that the total may be closer to two million pounds yet they only had assets of £404,250, most of which remained untouched in their high street bank accounts. Naturally the judge ordered the money from this account to be confiscated. So what happened to the rest of the money? The family lived in a modest end terraced council house therefore they did not buy property with the monies that they received from the crimes. When the house was searched they didn't even own a computer and appeared to be living in relative poverty. They did not travel abroad. Olive had never even travelled outside of the Bolton area. On the whole it appeared that they were not motivated by money at all. Could it have been that Shaun was thus motivated by his frustrated talent as an artist and inspired by ambition? This would appear to be the reasons but there is still a vast amount of the money raised from these forgeries that is unaccounted for so financial gain cannot be eliminated as an excuse for committing the frauds. Given this knowledge and that their sentences did not reflect the magnitude of the crime we are left with an important question amongst many others - Does Crime Really Pay?Art forgery usually refers to creating and in particular selling works of art that are falsely attributed to be work of another. It is usually the work of a more famous artist that is copied. Art forgery is extremely profitable but modern analysis and techniques have made the identification of forged artwork much easier. So just how did the Greenhalgh's manage to walk into Museums and fool professional curators with such vast knowledge and experience? How on earth did they get away with it for so long? What eventually brought them to justice? The Greenhalgh case is one of fascination for it is a story of an ordinary family of little means with little education or money and who managed to not only fool the art world but send shock waves within it and outside it. When the backgrounds of those involved were revealed in the press many people were more than surprised and asked questions such as: What could have possibly driven them to commit such acts?What methods did they use to fool the parties involved?How did they get rid of their forgeries?What methods were used to distinguish the forged artworks from the originals?