Bold theft of Callas dress
Police in Athens were yesterday examining surveillance camera footage to identify the thief who stole a valuable dress belonging to the late diva Maria Callas from the Italian Cultural Institute last Friday. The dress was one of hundreds of personal belongings of the internationally acclaimed opera singer on display to mark the 30th anniversary of her death. «It was an exceptionally well-organized theft,» Institute director Melita Palestini said yesterday when the robbery was discovered following the center’s three-day closure for Pentecost. According to Palestini, the location of the dress in a corner behind a column probably helped the thief remove it among the crowds attending the exhibition on Friday, the closing day. But cameras recorded the thief, a man in his 40s, police said. Police say that the thief may have removed the dress, valued at 100,000 euros, on behalf of a collector.
