In a plot twist that befits the stuff of Columbo, the stolen Oscars case has yielded yet another suspect. One John Harris, 55, of Los Angeles was charged Friday with one count of receiving stolen property and one count of being an accessory to grand theft, the Los Angeles Daily News reports.
No big deal, right? Well, get a load of this: Harris is also the brother of Willie Fulgear, the same 61-year-old man who was rewarded $50K (and invites to the Oscars ceremony) for recovering 52 of the 55 missing statuettes in March.
Apparently, detectives from the Los Angeles Police Department’s Burglary-Auto Theft Division had learned that Harris had stored the loots at his L.A. home and was expecting to get paid money for doing so. No other details were released about the case.
According to the Daily News report, the LAPD has begun an investigation into whether Fulgear was also involved in the theft.
“We find it really, really, really unusual that his brother has them at his home and within a short period of time, they’re found by his brother, near a Dumpster near Willie’s house,” Detective Marc Zavala told the newspaper Friday.
Despite its suspicious nature, Harris told the cops that the whole thing was merely a “coincidence.”
Back in March, 55 Oscars were stolen from a warehouse loading dock in Bell, Calif. Two persons, Lawrence Ledent, a truck driver from Los Angeles, and Anthony Hart, a dock worker from La Puente, were arrested and charged with grand theft soon after.
Three Oscar statuettes are still missing along with Fulgear’s cash reward, which the 61-year-old says was stolen from his home while he was visiting relatives in the South.
Harris will be arraigned in Los Angeles Superior Court on Nov. 8.
