NEWPORT BEACH : Truck Recovered Without Stolen Furs

A stolen truck that had contained nearly $1 million worth of artworks, furs, tapestries and other high-priced merchandise was recovered Sunday in Newport Beach--minus the furs, worth about $200,000.

The rental truck, discovered stolen Saturday from the parking lot of the Radisson Plaza Hotel in Irvine, was found by Irvine police at 9:50 a.m. in the parking lot of Eastbluff Kindergarten Center on Vista del Oro, north of Fashion Island, Police Sgt. Mike Ogden said.

Police checked the truck for fingerprints and returned it and its remaining contents to Alexander Mahban, owner of the International Fur Collections company. The contents of the truck, which included tapestries and historical artifacts, were to be auctioned over the weekend.

Information on the results of the fingerprint sweep or on possible suspects was not available Sunday, Ogden said.

Mahban said 43 furs were stolen, ranging in value from $5,000 to $15,000. Most of the properties sold at his auctions are on consignment, he said.

Along with the furs, Mahban said, the truck contained an early 1800s letter from a French general to Napoleon Bonaparte, inscribed with Bonaparte’s handwritten response, worth $175,000. The letter was recovered.

Saturday’s auction went on with merchandise from two other trucks, he said, but Mahban estimated his business lost from $300,000 to $400,000.

“Naturally, it was very bad because a lot of people came for the rugs” that were in the stolen truck, Mahban said. The tapestries were recovered, but Mahban said he could not categorize them in time for Sunday’s auction.

It was the second theft within a week for Mahban. He lost $5 million worth of jewelry Monday in a robbery in San Diego, and the valuables have not been found. It was not known if the two thefts were related.

Mahban, who has been conducting auctions since 1965, said his only other comparable loss was in 1980, when he lost about $2 million worth of merchandise in the MGM Grand Hotel fire in Las Vegas, which killed 84 people.