The leader of the murdered crowd entrusted IRA with stolen art works in Boston, according to the former Met's detective | Art and design

It's a beautiful crime scene. On the first floor of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, the Dutch Room is lined with green silk wallpaper from the terracotta floor to the oak wood ceiling. On the walls hang works by Rubens, Dürer, Van Dyke and others. But it's the empty frames that catch the eye.

There is an easel on which once stood The concert, a masterpiece by Johannes Vermeer. It is now the most valuable piece of art in the world, worth an estimated $ 200 million. On the back wall, a golden rectangle frames only silk wallpaper.

It took place once Christ in a storm on the Sea of ​​Galilee, Only known seascape of Rembrandt. Like the Vermeer, he was cut off from his frame in 1990 and has disappeared, along with two other Rembrandts, five Degas sketches, a Manet painting, a Govert Flinck landscape and a bronze floret of a Napoleonic battle flag. In total, about half a billion dollars worth of art.

In the early hours of March 18, the robbery was committed by two men disguised as police officers who, after handcuffing the museum guards, spent 81 minutes in the galleries. It remains not only the biggest stolen art of all time, but also the largest private property theft in America. Despite a $ 10 million reward, none of the works have been seen in public yet.

A name that has always been associated with the robbery is James "Whitey" Bulger. The former mafia leader was killed in prison last week while he was serving two life sentences for 11 murders. In the early 1970s, Bulger led the Winter Hill Gang, a US-Irish crowd that terrorized Boston for more than a decade. But he lived a double life as an FBI informant, providing the bureau with information about rival criminals.

After racing in 1995, Bulger spent 16 years on the list of the most wanted by the FBI. After the death of Osama bin Laden in 2011, he was arrested while living in a seaside apartment in Santa Monica with his longtime partner, Catherine Greig. . The elderly couple were hiding at the sight and its neighbors called it "the Gaskos". FBI agents found a hiding place of $ 800,000 and an arsenal of 30 firearms. Art lovers were disappointed by the fact that there was no Vermeer over the bed or Rembrandt in the living room. Not even a Degas drawing or two in the bathroom.

After his arrest, Bulger did not voluntarily release information about Gardner's robbery that could have resulted in a more lenient sentence or a more comfortable cell. And yet, according to Charles Hill, a former Scotland Yard detective turned private investigator, Bulger was the key to stealing.

"The new morning of March 18, 1990, even the dogs in the streets of South Boston had to know that Whitey was involved in one way or another before, during or after the flight," says Hill. "Whitey was an IRA sympathizer, he liked to associate with" the cause "and was involved in arms and drug dealing transactions to the Republic."

Hill thinks the paintings were shipped to Ireland as part of an agreement with an IRA affiliated gang. "After sending a shipment of arms and ammunition by the Irish navy off Kerry County in 1984, Whitey felt he owed one to his friends in the Republic. I believe that he offered them the paintings.

"There is no compelling evidence of that, but I fight art crime rationally and irrationally, intellectually and viscerally," he says. "This technique serves me well as a style and measure of success."

Hill's track record is impressive. As an undercover detective, he led the 1996 operation to retrieve Edvard Munch's information. The Scream, stolen two years earlier at the National Museum of Norway. In 1993, he directed the recovery of a Vermeer and a Goya stolen in 1986 at Russborough House, County Wicklow. The robbery was organized by Martin Cahill, a Dublin gangster known as General, who nicknamed John Boorman's 1998 film in which Brendan Gleeson played the role of the criminal.

According to Hill, this last flight – with the Vermeer as a major asset – was the inspiration of Boston's work.

Following a network of prospects, including many contacts from the underworld, Hill is convinced that Gardner's treasures are still hidden in the Republic of Ireland. "Even though Bulger had not ordered the flight originally, he would have muscled himself and would have taken control of the load soon after it had occurred."

Anthony Amore, Director of Security at the Gardner Museum, outlined the possible involvement of Bulger, citing the lack of solid evidence. Amore, who spends a lot of time looking at the empty frames, says, "If you were a homicide detective, you would go to the scene and observe the person's stuck outlines on the floor. I come here every day and these are my recorded impressions. "

John Wilson presents Front Row on BBC Radio 4