Speaker 1: April two thousand eleven a warehouse in Simi Valley, California.
Speaker 1: Stephen Fishler, a comic book dealer, is standing outside. Next
Speaker 1: to him is Los Angeles Police Detective Donald Harrisick. The
Speaker 1: two are about to go inside the warehouse, where both
Speaker 1: men think there's an ending to this story, the story
Speaker 1: of four stolen comic books from the home of Nicholas Cage,
Speaker 1: including the world's most valuable title action comics. No one
Speaker 1: that comic might be just a few feet away after
Speaker 1: eleven years of searching. It's tantalizingly close. But while they
Speaker 1: suspect the comic is inside, they don't know who might
Speaker 1: be with it, so hurry. Sick shares some words of caution.
Speaker 1: Here's what Stephen remembers. And they gave me sort of
Speaker 1: the lay of the land, the how they wanted this
Speaker 1: to go down. Detective Horristic would poses my partner, And
Speaker 1: they said to me, yeah, because I'm I'm trying to
Speaker 1: do a comic deal. Obviously this is not a normal
Speaker 1: comic deal because it's a stolen book. But he says,
Speaker 1: if there's trouble, anybody brings out a gun, hit the
Speaker 1: floor and I went golden I said, if somebody brings
Speaker 1: out a gun, don't worry. I can do that. That
Speaker 1: sounds well intense, but there are a few reasons why
Speaker 1: Donald Horresi is giving the warning. The first is that
Speaker 1: this isn't his first flirtation with people who are knowingly
Speaker 1: or not in possession of stolen art, and people in
Speaker 1: possession of stolen art can be dangerous. The second reason
Speaker 1: is that Donald Harrisk doesn't plan on letting the men
Speaker 1: inside know he's a cop, or that several cops are
Speaker 1: hiding nearby, at least not just yet. So there's risk,
Speaker 1: but the risk is worth it for both of them.
Speaker 1: Harrisik has an opportunity to add another recovery to his
Speaker 1: storied career as an art detective, and Fishler can put
Speaker 1: to bed a mystery that's been eating at him since
Speaker 1: two thousand, the mystery of how Nick Cage's comics were
Speaker 1: ripped off his wall during a party in a brazen
Speaker 1: and so far successful attempt to relieve him of his
Speaker 1: prized possessions. Anything could have happened to the comics. They
Speaker 1: could have been lost, or destroyed or damaged. But if
Speaker 1: the picture sent to Stephen just a couple of days prior,
Speaker 1: was any hint the most important comic had survived the
Speaker 1: past decade in one piece. To confirm it, all the
Speaker 1: two of them had to do was walked through the door.
Speaker 1: That was it. The two walk inside, then Stephen notices
Speaker 1: something out of the corner of his eye. We get
Speaker 1: out and we go into an office and there was
Speaker 1: an individual standing outside, and as soon as we went
Speaker 1: in he must have realized who I was. He went
Speaker 1: into the office fifteen seconds after the tective and I
Speaker 1: went in, and I went kind of weird. He was
Speaker 1: waiting outside and then I looked at his hand. He's
Speaker 1: holding the Manila folder and I go that book was
Speaker 1: pictured in the Manila folder, but I can't see what's
Speaker 1: in it. And the individual with the Manila folder is
Speaker 1: pulled into an inner office is now sitting in this office,
Speaker 1: and the Minila folder is now open, and there's the
Speaker 1: book on like a little aprolic pedestal and we sit down.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's an original action one where I heart radio.
Speaker 1: This is Stealing Superman. I'm your host, Dana Schwartz, and
Speaker 1: this is episode seven. Strange Visitor two thousand eleven was
Speaker 1: turning out to be a tumultuous year for Cage. It
Speaker 1: was a time when, approaching his fifties, he was on
Speaker 1: shaky ground as a leading man. He was drifting away
Speaker 1: from his action star Heyday and many years removed from
Speaker 1: his last Oscar nomination. A major Disney movie, The Sorcerer's Apprentice,
Speaker 1: had disappointed a year earlier. Cages two thousand and eleven
Speaker 1: slate of films weren't much better, with little remembered titles
Speaker 1: like Season of the Witch and Drive Angry Another turn
Speaker 1: as more All's ghost Rider character debuted at the quote
Speaker 1: Butt Namathon to a reportedly poor reception. This was the
Speaker 1: beginning of a decade spent largely in the direct to
Speaker 1: television market, where the movies were often undeserving of Cage's talents.
Speaker 1: It had happened to John Travolta and to Bruce Willis.
Speaker 1: Cage like to say, making a lot of low budget
Speaker 1: movies was kind of like the old studio system where
Speaker 1: stars churned out movies. But there was no denying his
Speaker 1: career had stalled. Professionally, it wasn't his best year, But
Speaker 1: for our story, there was one bright spot. Art crime,
Speaker 1: as any good art crime detective will tell you, is
Speaker 1: a game of Patients extreme Patients. Art thieves may try
Speaker 1: to convert their illicit goods to money quickly, or they
Speaker 1: may decide they're far better off sitting on something for years,
Speaker 1: even decades. The general rule is, if a piece of
Speaker 1: stolen art doesn't service immediately, you may not see it
Speaker 1: for say, ten years, long enough for cops to lose
Speaker 1: interest and the trail of ownership to grow cold. In
Speaker 1: the case of Cages Action number one, it was eleven
Speaker 1: years close enough. In an earlier episode, we Told You.
Speaker 1: Art thefts are often preceded by media coverage of lavish
Speaker 1: auctions or high dollar sales, something to make the thief
Speaker 1: think about the value of something they could steal. The
Speaker 1: same can also hold true for art recovery. Someone in
Speaker 1: possession of a stolen item may see news of its
Speaker 1: value and how much it's increased since it was taken,
Speaker 1: and that can be the motivation to finally try and
Speaker 1: return it to the legitimate market. So what happened in
Speaker 1: two thousand eleven A few things. In February, Joanne Siegel,
Speaker 1: the widow of the late Superman co creator Jerry Siegel,
Speaker 1: passed away. It was covered in the media, often with
Speaker 1: a mention of how rare and valuable Action Comics Number
Speaker 1: one was, And in March of that year, Stephen Fishler
Speaker 1: made some history. His company, Comic Connect, an online marketplace
Speaker 1: for comics, sold a copy of Amazing Fantasy Number fifteen.
Speaker 1: That nineteen sixty two comic introduced Spider Man, and it's
Speaker 1: sold for an astounding one point one million, a new
Speaker 1: record for the wall Crawler. So what does that have
Speaker 1: to do with Action number one. In all of the
Speaker 1: ensuing media articles about the sale of Amazing Fantasy Number fifteen,
Speaker 1: reporters had to make a clarifying remark that while the
Speaker 1: sale was a record for Spider Man, it wasn't a
Speaker 1: comic book record. That honor still longed to Action number one.
Speaker 1: In two thousand ten, Fishler sold two copies of the comic,
Speaker 1: one for a million dollars and another for one point
Speaker 1: five million. The latter was the most expensive comic ever sold.
Speaker 1: So whoever was holding onto the comic taken from Nick
Speaker 1: Cage's home may have felt a new sense of urgency.
Speaker 1: And if someone happened to find that comic around that time,
Speaker 1: well they'd know it was worth quite a bit. Just
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks after news of that sale broke,
Speaker 1: Dan Dotson and his wife Laura were approached by two men.
Speaker 1: Dan and Laura run American Auctioneers, a storage locker liquidation
Speaker 1: business in California. If you've seen the A and E
Speaker 1: show Storage Wars, you've seen Dan. The premise of what
Speaker 1: Dan and Laura do is pretty simple to understand, although
Speaker 1: it's real not an easy job. American Auctioneers is hired
Speaker 1: by storage unit companies to auction off storage units that
Speaker 1: aren't up to date on their payments. Say someone rents
Speaker 1: the storage locker, stuffs it full of their belongings, then
Speaker 1: stops paying the monthly bill. The storage company is stuck
Speaker 1: with a bunch of stuff they don't want, so to
Speaker 1: recoup what they can, they auction off the contents to
Speaker 1: buyers who hope to profit from what's inside. The buyers
Speaker 1: can't really see any of it beforehand, just a glimpse,
Speaker 1: so it's kind of a crapshoot. You might get something
Speaker 1: valuable or you might get some old clothes. Either way,
Speaker 1: it makes for really good reality television. American Auctioneers, like
Speaker 1: every liquidator, gives the owners of the lockers every chance
Speaker 1: to come and collect their things before it's too late.
Speaker 1: They're required by law to print a public notice in
Speaker 1: newspapers with the names of the people who are past
Speaker 1: do on their bills. Those people can swooped back in
Speaker 1: even at the last minute. If they can pay up,
Speaker 1: they get to keep their stuff. If not, it's open season.
Speaker 1: That's what Dan was doing in March when he was
Speaker 1: approached by someone he recognized, a man about forty years old.
Speaker 1: The man whom he knew only as Sylvester, had recently
Speaker 1: arrived on the storage unit scene. Like a lot of people.
Speaker 1: He may have been compelled to get into it based
Speaker 1: on the popularity of storage wars. Either way, he was
Speaker 1: a new but familiar face. Originally, he had approached Dan's wife, Laura,
Speaker 1: who's the co owner of their company. Here's Laura. I
Speaker 1: just remember his name being Sylvester, and he had a
Speaker 1: friend with him, and they were they were shorter guys.
Speaker 1: I just know that. When I'm doing my auction and
Speaker 1: stuff like that, I try to remember the whole crowd,
Speaker 1: and I try to make you look at everybody's face
Speaker 1: so I don't miss anybody's bid and so forth. And
Speaker 1: I just remember they were maybe five ft three each
Speaker 1: of them and smaller guys. Laura thought Sylvester and his
Speaker 1: friend had a question about the auction she and Dan
Speaker 1: were holding. That was typically why people approached them to
Speaker 1: ask questions about how it all works. But Sylvester had
Speaker 1: something else on his mind. He wanted to invite her
Speaker 1: to his home. Well, here I am in this auction
Speaker 1: place and I'm doing an auction and I'm on my
Speaker 1: like last unit, and a guy comes up with a
Speaker 1: friend and asked me. I said, okay, you're here for
Speaker 1: the auction. Everything is. I gave him the terms real
Speaker 1: quick because I realized, oh, he's just showing up. And
Speaker 1: he said to me, do you have comic books you
Speaker 1: find in units? And so do you guys have buyers
Speaker 1: and stuff like that? And could you appraise a comic
Speaker 1: book for me? Sylvester was looking for guidance, and you know,
Speaker 1: when it's really kind of local over here, you could
Speaker 1: just come on over to my house. And I said, no,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be the one that would just come to
Speaker 1: your house because I had never seen this guy before.
Speaker 1: And he said, well, my name is Sylvester, and he
Speaker 1: had a another guy with him, and I recalled that
Speaker 1: they were new to the auction, and they were interested
Speaker 1: in looking at units, is what I thought. And I said,
Speaker 1: last unit, last unit, happening right now. And he wants
Speaker 1: me to please come to his house, and okay, let
Speaker 1: me look at this last unit. But if you could
Speaker 1: just come before your next sale. And it seems like
Speaker 1: you know about comic books, I said, listen, I wouldn't
Speaker 1: be the one to come. Let me give you my
Speaker 1: husband's information. He will be doing an auction on Saturday,
Speaker 1: was the nearest time. And he said to me, okay,
Speaker 1: well great, then I'm gonna come and see your husband.
Speaker 1: And I figured, you know what my husband and I
Speaker 1: do is we will look for provenance and we will
Speaker 1: look for through a fem roun paper stuff if we
Speaker 1: can find anything online. And I hadn't put it. I
Speaker 1: put it into my head and kind of out of
Speaker 1: my head. So Sylvester came back that Saturday and he
Speaker 1: brought something with him, and this time he approached Laura's husband.
Speaker 1: Here's Dan. So he brought it down to our auction
Speaker 1: on Saturday, and I was looking at it. You know,
Speaker 1: I was coming through that comic book and it just
Speaker 1: looked so nice and Prestine, I just you know, it
Speaker 1: was pretty sure that it was probably reproduction, but it wasn't.
Speaker 1: Sylvester explained to Dan that he had just bought a
Speaker 1: storage locker from American auctioneers. After cleaning it out and
Speaker 1: sorting through its contents, he made the discovery of the Century,
Speaker 1: a nearly flawless copy of Action Comics Number one tucked
Speaker 1: inside of a large hardcover book. Dan knows a lot
Speaker 1: about a lot when it comes to stuff people find
Speaker 1: in storage lockers, from antiques to guns, but he's not
Speaker 1: an expert in comic books. He didn't know exactly what
Speaker 1: he was looking at. Not not really, No, I didn't.
Speaker 1: I saw that it was June comic, but I didn't
Speaker 1: realize it was I didn't realize how special it was
Speaker 1: at the time. For Dan, there wasn't any thought to
Speaker 1: trying to get involved. No, no, I didn't even realize
Speaker 1: the value of it. Um. You know, I and I
Speaker 1: don't really have connections to by, you know, comic books.
Speaker 1: So while he figured this could be something, he decided
Speaker 1: to pass Sylvester along to someone else. Lalo was, you know,
Speaker 1: hitting up our auctions at the time, and I just
Speaker 1: introduced them. I think the guy's name was Sylvester, and
Speaker 1: I said, Sylvester, Mark, Mark, Sylvester, you know, knock yourselves out.
Speaker 1: And then I, you know, I didn't really think anything
Speaker 1: else of it. Balalo is Mark Balalo, another storage unit liquidator.
Speaker 1: Mark was relatively new to the scene too. He would
Speaker 1: make appearances on Storage Wars, flashing a lot of money
Speaker 1: to scoop up storage units, wearing sunglasses indoors, and generally
Speaker 1: being provocative enough to make an impression on reality television.
Speaker 1: You know, Balalo at the time, I think really wanted
Speaker 1: to be on Storage Wars. And and he pretended that
Speaker 1: we knew each other like forever, and we didn't know
Speaker 1: each other, you know, forever. But Mark did know about
Speaker 1: comics more than Dan and Laura at any rate. So
Speaker 1: he and Sylvester got to talking, and Mark said enough
Speaker 1: to convince Sylvester that he could find a proper buyer
Speaker 1: for his discovery. He took the comics, put it in
Speaker 1: the safe of his warehouse in Simi Valley, and then
Speaker 1: he made a phone call. He called the one person
Speaker 1: whose name had been in hundreds of newspapers as the
Speaker 1: man who was earning record prices for rare comic books,
Speaker 1: including amazing Fantasy number fifteen and the very comic Mark
Speaker 1: was holding in his hands. Of all the dealers he
Speaker 1: could have called, Mark called Stephen Fishler. Stephen Fishler couldn't
Speaker 1: believe it. The Action number one he sold to Cage,
Speaker 1: the one he had been searching for, just material realized
Speaker 1: in front of his face. An employee of Minds is
Speaker 1: the individual contacted him with an Action one, and I
Speaker 1: go to the person's word station. They look at their
Speaker 1: computer and I see in this email a picture of
Speaker 1: an Action one. It's not in a bag. It appears
Speaker 1: to be in photograph while it's sitting in a Manila
Speaker 1: four They're on screen. Was the comic unceremoniously tucked into
Speaker 1: a Manila folder and resting on a car seat. But
Speaker 1: how could Stephen tell it was the comic? Rare comics
Speaker 1: have markings, certain distinguishable markings that distanced them from the
Speaker 1: hundreds of similar copies. Stephen felt he knew what cages
Speaker 1: Action number one looked like, the way a parent can
Speaker 1: tell the difference between identical twins. The secret was in
Speaker 1: the blue banner. Just over the tight a logo. There
Speaker 1: were white markings. Stephen knew about markings other collectors or
Speaker 1: a thief may not even be aware of. And the
Speaker 1: markings were there exactly as Stephen remembered that. And I
Speaker 1: do a double tape, and I will say it probably
Speaker 1: took me five seconds to realize it was next book.
Speaker 1: But I found a copy of a picture of the book,
Speaker 1: just to be double short. And my employee emailed me,
Speaker 1: forwarding me the original email. I called this individual up.
Speaker 1: His name was Mark. He was in Semi Valley, and
Speaker 1: I thanked him for contacting me. And it looks like
Speaker 1: a wonderful book, and they wanted to sell it. And
Speaker 1: he indicated that he was friends with the owner. He's
Speaker 1: representing the owner. And they said that the book was
Speaker 1: purchased in an aukstion like a storage unit auction. The
Speaker 1: question was what exactly did Mark Ballelo want Stephen to do.
Speaker 1: According to Stephen, it was to authenticate the comic, to
Speaker 1: make sure it was the genuine article and not a
Speaker 1: reproduction or a phony like the one that had turned
Speaker 1: up in Memphis back in two thousand and two, or
Speaker 1: the ones unscrupulous ebayers sometimes tried to pass off as
Speaker 1: the real thing. If it was the real thing, then
Speaker 1: Mark would go looking for a buyer, one who would
Speaker 1: pay him at least a million dollars for the comic.
Speaker 1: And who better to ask for help than the man
Speaker 1: who was just in the news for setting seven figure
Speaker 1: records for comic sales. I had the first million dollar
Speaker 1: sale of a comic book. It was another Action one.
Speaker 1: It was before this, and I believe that they heard
Speaker 1: about this million dollars sale because it was mine. Mine
Speaker 1: aim was well over it, and that's where they connected
Speaker 1: the figure of a million, and I think that that's
Speaker 1: why New Contact. So what happened was I sold See
Speaker 1: an Action one for a million, then I sold an
Speaker 1: Action one in for one point five. So that was
Speaker 1: all before and that was publicized. So that was all
Speaker 1: before Mark Contact. But Mark didn't seem to acknowledge that
Speaker 1: it could be Nicholas Cage's copy, and Stephen didn't mention
Speaker 1: it either. If Mark knew it could be Cages, why
Speaker 1: go to Cages comic dealer. Isn't that launching yourself directly
Speaker 1: in the line of fire? Not exactly. I don't think
Speaker 1: he did, And my feeling is he just knew that
Speaker 1: I dealt in Action once and I was prominent dealer.
Speaker 1: He found a lot of information about out me, but
Speaker 1: not that connection. And I also said to myself, if
Speaker 1: they know it was stolen from California, let's not get
Speaker 1: a California deal over here, because he might really know
Speaker 1: that this is stolen book. Let's get a New York guy,
Speaker 1: because if if it's New York, well maybe this is
Speaker 1: a smaller chance that'll know it's stolen. Stephen did two things,
Speaker 1: and I said, oh, that's great. And I'm knowing the
Speaker 1: entire time that this story might not be real, but
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter because they have the book. And I
Speaker 1: called the detective horrific after I got off the phone,
Speaker 1: saying that the main book, the Action One, is in
Speaker 1: l A. And I said, I'm being contacted. I have
Speaker 1: a picture of it. This is the individual's name. I
Speaker 1: sent him the email. That's it. That's the book, um,
Speaker 1: and he wants me to come and look at it.
Speaker 1: And I booked a ticket. So the coordination happened where
Speaker 1: I came out the next day, met the detective at
Speaker 1: the local police station that was near Simi Valley. Harrisick
Speaker 1: you'll remember is Donald Harresik, the l A. P. D
Speaker 1: Art detective whom Stephen had sparred with a handful of
Speaker 1: times over the years. To Stephen, Donald hadn't been overly
Speaker 1: aggressive in hunting down the cage. Comics art theft was
Speaker 1: rampant in Los Angeles, and in fairness to Donald, there
Speaker 1: was always a lot going on with virtually no manpower
Speaker 1: devoted to it. Donald had one partner. If that still,
Speaker 1: Donald agreed that Steven should go and meet with the
Speaker 1: two of them, with Mark and Sylvester. Donald would accompany
Speaker 1: him as an associate. It would be a sting operation,
Speaker 1: one where the contraband wasn't drugs or guns, but a
Speaker 1: comic book. The next day, Stephen found himself outside Mark
Speaker 1: Balelo's warehouse in Simi Valley, California, a massive struck sure
Speaker 1: where Mark housed his inventory of items he bought and sold.
Speaker 1: He dealt in electronics, a thriving eBay business, live auctions,
Speaker 1: and business was apparently booming. Stephen got the pep talk
Speaker 1: from Donald, the one where he should duck if someone
Speaker 1: brought out a gun, but Donald wasn't taking chances. He
Speaker 1: stationed a number of officers around the warehouse in case
Speaker 1: backup was needed. The situation may have seemed funny on
Speaker 1: the surface, it was after all a comic, but one
Speaker 1: worth potentially millions of dollars, and when that kind of
Speaker 1: money is involved, people can be unpredictable. Stephen and Donald
Speaker 1: walked into the warehouse before anyone could say anything. Stephen
Speaker 1: caught sight of the man with a Manila folder. It
Speaker 1: was a light yellow office folder, the kind of stationary
Speaker 1: you tuck and earnings report in. Not a valuable comic.
Speaker 1: It's a great way for the book to get damaged,
Speaker 1: wrinkled pages torn. Suddenly, Stephen was thinking that even if
Speaker 1: this was the comic, who knew what kind of damage
Speaker 1: it had sustained in the past eleven years. Anything from
Speaker 1: humidity to sunlight could have damaged it beyond repair. Comics
Speaker 1: can't be restored without someone noticing it, and collectors have
Speaker 1: very definitive opinions about restored comics. They're often seen as
Speaker 1: something less valuable. This comic was from night. It needed
Speaker 1: to be treated kindly, and here was a man carrying
Speaker 1: it like he was a waiter with a menu. Stephen's
Speaker 1: attention was diverted when Mark Ballelo appeared. Stephen hadn't seen
Speaker 1: Storage Wars, had never met Ballelo, knew virtually nothing of
Speaker 1: the storage unit scene. But Mark was easy enough to profile.
Speaker 1: He wore shiny shirts, he talked a lot, He acted
Speaker 1: like the car salesman he used to be. He invited
Speaker 1: Stephen and Donald into an office. The four of them
Speaker 1: sat down. Mark seemed loose, easy going, excited. A seven
Speaker 1: figure pay day had practically dropped itself into his lap.
Speaker 1: If he knew about Cage or that Stephen's friend was
Speaker 1: a cop, he showed no signs of it at all.
Speaker 1: He was here to be told he was about to
Speaker 1: come into a windfall, or at least half of it.
Speaker 1: That was what he and Sylvester had agreed to. Stephen
Speaker 1: picked up the comic. Anything could have happened prior to
Speaker 1: this point. Mark and Sylvester could have gotten cold feet
Speaker 1: for whatever reason and disappeared. They could have decided to
Speaker 1: sell it to someone else. They could have sent a
Speaker 1: picture they had found online. Or Stephen could have been
Speaker 1: mistaken about the markings. There was no way for him
Speaker 1: to know for sure until he had the comic in
Speaker 1: his hands. An original action one beautiful me. I really
Speaker 1: appreciate contacting me about it. And this individual who seemed
Speaker 1: to think his name told me his name was Arthur
Speaker 1: just off the top of my head, Arthur was Sylvester.
Speaker 1: He reiterated the story about how he got the book,
Speaker 1: and they bought a store of JUnit and it was
Speaker 1: found inside another book. I think I might have asked,
Speaker 1: was there anything else in there? Any other comic books?
Speaker 1: They said no, And there's a little ooing and eyeing
Speaker 1: over the book. They wanted a million dollars for it.
Speaker 1: As the men talked, Stephen examined the comic, and right
Speaker 1: away he knew this was Nicolas Cage's Action number one.
Speaker 1: A tiny white splotch inside one of the blue banners
Speaker 1: confirmed it. Like a fingerprint missing eleven years, found today,
Speaker 1: and not only that, in virtually the same condition it
Speaker 1: was when it was taken from Cage's house on purpose
Speaker 1: or by accident. Whoever had been in possession of it
Speaker 1: all this time had managed not to ruin it. For
Speaker 1: a comic that had been purportedly stuffed inside a storage unit,
Speaker 1: one that may not have even had a climate controlled environment,
Speaker 1: it was pristine. Stephen wanted to exhale, but couldn't really
Speaker 1: couldn't tip them off. He scanned the two men in
Speaker 1: front of him, Mark and Sylvester. Stephen remembers. Sylvester kept
Speaker 1: saying his name was Arthur. They were both hard to read.
Speaker 1: They didn't seem nervous, so maybe they didn't know the
Speaker 1: comics history. Maybe they both believed they were two of
Speaker 1: the luckiest people on the planet. Stephen started talking to
Speaker 1: them to try to understand how they wound up with
Speaker 1: the comic in their hands. It is Arthur a little
Speaker 1: bit of Mark, because Mark was really really not a
Speaker 1: comic deal or so he's he's just trying to put
Speaker 1: from what he said, parties together to do a deal.
Speaker 1: I'm sure he was getting a cut for his work.
Speaker 1: I asked Arthur, who obviously walked in with the book.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm trying to get some more details. Wanted
Speaker 1: to see what other information, and he had his story
Speaker 1: and he was sticking to it about where it came from.
Speaker 1: So I would think that if somebody bought a storage
Speaker 1: unit would be very clear on where they got it from.
Speaker 1: To see if there's anything more in there. Stephen wasn't
Speaker 1: getting much more detail from either man. They were simply
Speaker 1: two people who wanted to know if the rare comics
Speaker 1: Sylvester found was the real deal, and it was, but
Speaker 1: that wasn't necessarily a good thing for them. Stephen and
Speaker 1: Donald had made an arrangement. Once Stephen was sure this
Speaker 1: was the book, he'd not at Donald, and then Donald,
Speaker 1: who was mostly quiet up until now, would start doing
Speaker 1: all of the talking. And then Detective Horristic, who I
Speaker 1: introduces my partner when we walked in, grabbed his business
Speaker 1: card and handed it to the two gentlemen, and just
Speaker 1: not a business card from a comic dealer, but a
Speaker 1: business card from a police officer. Police Detective Donald announced
Speaker 1: he was a cop, and suddenly the air seemed to
Speaker 1: go out of the room. He may as well have
Speaker 1: just set the comic book on fire. And he explains
Speaker 1: who he is, and he brings out a copy of
Speaker 1: the original police report from two thousands, and I literally
Speaker 1: saw the individual I remember as Arthur turned gray. All
Speaker 1: the blood ansom. Everybody thought they had a million dollar
Speaker 1: paid day person flew out to buy the book. And
Speaker 1: here's a cop, here's a police detective. As Mark and
Speaker 1: Sylvester winced, Donald announced he was taking possession of the
Speaker 1: comic and did just that, collecting it in its manila folder.
Speaker 1: The officers outside rushed in, making sure no one left.
Speaker 1: It was now up to Donald to determine the veracity
Speaker 1: of Sylvester's story how he had gotten his hands on
Speaker 1: the comic. The two spoke for maybe thirty minutes behind
Speaker 1: closed doors. Stephen paced back and forth, the curiosity of
Speaker 1: a collector eating at him. Some art investigations are about
Speaker 1: finding the art, and strictly about finding the art. The
Speaker 1: how of it all can get lost amid the investigator's caseload.
Speaker 1: But here was a direct line between the comic and
Speaker 1: the and who claimed to have found it. Donald Harrisik
Speaker 1: was a seasoned detective. If there was truth to be found,
Speaker 1: Stephen figured he'd be able to find it. When Donald
Speaker 1: finished with Sylvester and walked out, Stephen went up to him,
Speaker 1: eager to get the details, eager to share them with Cage,
Speaker 1: who was about to get some very good news. Stephen
Speaker 1: half expected to see Sylvester being hustled away by officers,
Speaker 1: dragged back to the station for further questionings, but Sylvester
Speaker 1: just strolled out unescorted. At that point, Detective Horristic takes
Speaker 1: the individual who remembers Arthur into another room. They probably
Speaker 1: spend about half an hour talking, and they talked to
Speaker 1: Mark Allelo and Detective Horristic says, yeah, we're really not
Speaker 1: able to get any more useful information. I said, I
Speaker 1: think this is a story that they can talk that
Speaker 1: he says doable is, but they're not giving you any
Speaker 1: more information about where they the Detective one or technically seven.
Speaker 1: I believe that they knew it was stolen and they
Speaker 1: had a cover story already in case it gets found out.
Speaker 1: Stephen wasn't sure he was hearing Donald correctly, and why
Speaker 1: did Sylvester just get up and walk out? Pretty soon
Speaker 1: everyone was clearing out of the warehouse. Donald returned to
Speaker 1: the L a p. D. Comic into Stephen immediately phone Cage,
Speaker 1: who was enthusiastic about the news outside. I called Nick
Speaker 1: and I told him that the Action One is now back,
Speaker 1: and he was very very happy. It was a very
Speaker 1: defeating feeling having his best book stolen out of his house,
Speaker 1: and it was a bit of a victory getting the
Speaker 1: Action One back, But even though the comic had been recovered,
Speaker 1: things felt incomplete. While the comic belonged to Cage, he
Speaker 1: had been paid by his insurance company, so really it
Speaker 1: belonged to them. And then and that was assuming Donald
Speaker 1: was prepared to return it. He had an investigation to
Speaker 1: finish to see whether sylvester story held up. Donald still
Speaker 1: needed to do one other thing. He phoned William Hughes,
Speaker 1: the man who had bought Action number one from Southebes
Speaker 1: back in and asked for the catalog. Remember back in
Speaker 1: episode four we mentioned southe Bees took a very precise
Speaker 1: series of photos of this very comic book, and it
Speaker 1: would make all the difference later in the story, well
Speaker 1: my friends later is now. Donald wanted to use those
Speaker 1: photos for comparison. In all, there were fifteen tiny but
Speaker 1: distinct markings or irregularities unique to this copy, all of
Speaker 1: them painstakingly documented by the auction house. It was, as
Speaker 1: Stephen said, a perfect match. Beyond all doubt. This was
Speaker 1: Cages comic. But how did a man named Sylvester find it?
Speaker 1: A better question nagged at Stephen. Had he really found
Speaker 1: it at all? The story Sylvester told Donald Harresik was
Speaker 1: a fascinating one. He said he had discovered the Action
Speaker 1: number one in an abandoned storage unit he bought at auction.
Speaker 1: This seems pretty straightforward. If he bought it at auction,
Speaker 1: then you just try to locate the original owner. Of
Speaker 1: the locker to see what information they might have. After all,
Speaker 1: the comic was in their possession, right, the storage facility
Speaker 1: would have those names, so would Dan Dotson. And even
Speaker 1: if they didn't remember that, Dan had to print the
Speaker 1: names of the locker owners in the paper as a
Speaker 1: legal requirement. So all Donald would have had to do
Speaker 1: is go to the library to grab some back issues.
Speaker 1: But here's the problem, the biggest problem. Sylvester said he
Speaker 1: bought multiple storage units in March, and he simply didn't
Speaker 1: know which storage unit the comic had come from. Somehow
Speaker 1: the contents of all of the units had gotten all
Speaker 1: mixed up. Here's Dan Dotson, That's what he had said.
Speaker 1: And he had been coming around for a for a minute,
Speaker 1: and you know, bought a lot of units from a
Speaker 1: lot of different facilities, so it was pretty impossible for
Speaker 1: that time to figure out what or where I really
Speaker 1: was motivated to dig into it, figure anything out. To
Speaker 1: be honest with you, I don't know which facility he
Speaker 1: may have bought it from, and he said that he
Speaker 1: bought it from one of ours, so I didn't have
Speaker 1: any reason to doubt that. Here's Laura, because I've been
Speaker 1: buying units and I put everything together because I was like, Wow,
Speaker 1: where did you buying it from? What did you get
Speaker 1: this from? What unit? And stuff from them? So excited
Speaker 1: we like to put providence and put a story together,
Speaker 1: you know, because I just can't really tell you. I
Speaker 1: just know that it was a bunch of units, and
Speaker 1: I got a bunch of stuff, and and he was
Speaker 1: buying a lot of stuff from my husband. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: my husband said, I've been selling until Sylvester has been
Speaker 1: buying the heck out of units. So I just think, Wow,
Speaker 1: he scored. Sylvester had bought a lot of ship, so
Speaker 1: much ship that it co mingled, making pinpointing where the
Speaker 1: comic came from impossible. But if Sylvester didn't know which
Speaker 1: storage unit the comic had come from, then Donald couldn't
Speaker 1: have any assurance. The people who owned the lockers, if
Speaker 1: they could be found at all, wouldn't simply deny the
Speaker 1: comic had been in their particular one. It was kind
Speaker 1: of like saying that the comic had just been found
Speaker 1: in the street. The providence, the ability to gauge where
Speaker 1: the comic came from it was lost. It was either
Speaker 1: an incredible stroke of luck for the thief or one
Speaker 1: of the better cover stories the detective had ever heard.
Speaker 1: Here's Stephen Fishler. I don't believe that these guys gave
Speaker 1: the detective any specific information about any storage unit. I
Speaker 1: can't remember if they even indicated what facility they think
Speaker 1: the storage unit was. I don't remember that. But there
Speaker 1: was definitely pretty much a dead end in terms of
Speaker 1: investigating the storage unit. If you're if you're a police detective,
Speaker 1: and you believe that this is a cover story and
Speaker 1: it really was never in a storage facility or storage unit,
Speaker 1: you're not going to spend a bunch of time, you know,
Speaker 1: dealing with the storage units. This isn't as unusual a
Speaker 1: situation as it may seem. A lot of art has
Speaker 1: been discovered over the years stolen art original art inside
Speaker 1: storage units. If you are in possession of a rare
Speaker 1: item that's been liberated from its owner, you may not
Speaker 1: want to keep it on your property. So it's entirely
Speaker 1: possible someone decided the safest place for cages stolen action
Speaker 1: comics number one was in a storage unit. But would
Speaker 1: they simply then forget to pay the bill? Would you
Speaker 1: forget to pay the bill on the unit that had
Speaker 1: a million dollars or more inside of it. Donald Herresik
Speaker 1: was prepared to dig into this more, but then Mark Blelow,
Speaker 1: the man whom Sylvester turned to for help with the comic,
Speaker 1: made a move of his own. Mark recognized the value
Speaker 1: of publicity in his line of work, and being the
Speaker 1: co finder of Action Comics Number one was worth the
Speaker 1: of headlines. Before Donald could blink, Mark was talking to
Speaker 1: the press. This made Donald very unhappy. In an interview
Speaker 1: of his own, he said he wished that Mark hadn't
Speaker 1: opened his big mouth. The problem was if anyone else
Speaker 1: happened to be involved or knew where cages. Two remaining
Speaker 1: comics were the Detective Number twenty seven and the Detective
Speaker 1: Number one. They now knew the police were chasing a lead,
Speaker 1: but Mark was pretty happy to talk about it. In fact,
Speaker 1: he ran up to Laura Dotson not long after to
Speaker 1: tell her the news. And then Ballelo comes to one
Speaker 1: of my sales and he says, we'll never believe what happened.
Speaker 1: He says, you know, we're looking at that book and
Speaker 1: we're all inside the room, and then all of a
Speaker 1: sudden he's telling us, yes, this is something great, and
Speaker 1: I think, okay, the exchange is going to happen. We're
Speaker 1: gonna make money. And you know, I had your husband
Speaker 1: in and you guys for a hundred thousand dollars. I
Speaker 1: was like, what like a commission and we had no clue.
Speaker 1: I didn't know. You know, usually I think, and well,
Speaker 1: I guess this is how this game works. He goes,
Speaker 1: but it all fell apart, like go really And he goes, well,
Speaker 1: that turned out that I thought he was going to
Speaker 1: say it was a fake. And he says, all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, the doors bust open and it was the
Speaker 1: FBI or the police, and they said this was stolen.
Speaker 1: And he goes, oh my god. And I'm looking at
Speaker 1: the guy going, oh god, I'm so glad I didn't
Speaker 1: buy this comic book from him. If this was a
Speaker 1: big scheme, Mark was pretty happy to talk about it.
Speaker 1: He took a photo he had taken of the Action
Speaker 1: Number one surrounded by antiques and used it to announce
Speaker 1: an upcoming sale on Facebook, and then he dressed up
Speaker 1: as Superman, Cape and all for one of his live auctions.
Speaker 1: As much as Donald hated the attention, Mark was loving it.
Speaker 1: It wasn't more than a few weeks before Donald ran
Speaker 1: out of reasons to keep the comic. Sylvester story wasn't
Speaker 1: something that could be proven or disproven, and the law
Speaker 1: says that you're only in trouble for possession and of
Speaker 1: stolen material if you know it was stolen, you should
Speaker 1: have known it was stolen, or you admit to stealing it.
Speaker 1: Donald couldn't prove Mark or Sylvester knew it was Cages
Speaker 1: comic or a stolen comic, and there was nothing linking
Speaker 1: the two back to the Night of Cages party in
Speaker 1: two thousand. For Stephen, the news was bitter sweet. The
Speaker 1: comic was back, but it came without much of an
Speaker 1: explanation and whether the reason was Mark Ballelo talking or
Speaker 1: something else, Stephen felt Donald wasn't that interested in chasing
Speaker 1: the only lead they had, very frustrating. And then when
Speaker 1: I finally called him up, the only reason he paid
Speaker 1: attention was because I said, here's the name of the
Speaker 1: person who has here's the address there at they're offering
Speaker 1: it to me. I'm flying out, I have a flight.
Speaker 1: You can't spell it out more than that. I think
Speaker 1: who was stolen from? I think he took it seriously.
Speaker 1: I think you know they might be overwhelmed, and unless
Speaker 1: they're given something super concrete, they don't have the time
Speaker 1: to track everything down. Cage, for his part, declared the
Speaker 1: discovery divine providence and hoped the heirloom his words would
Speaker 1: be returned to his family. Reports indicated Cage had the
Speaker 1: option of returning the money the insurance company had given
Speaker 1: him for the comic, possibly with inflation. If he did,
Speaker 1: the comic would be handed back to him. In the
Speaker 1: fourteen years since Cage first purchased it, Action Number one
Speaker 1: had appreciated in value by a lot. Remember that Stephen
Speaker 1: Fishler sold two Action Number one for over a million
Speaker 1: dollars each, neither in as good a condition as the
Speaker 1: Cage copy. Cage wanted the book back, but he didn't
Speaker 1: want to keep it, and the police had investigation for
Speaker 1: a number of and kept it in a safe at
Speaker 1: a secure police location. And then I eventually, in another
Speaker 1: trip to California, I came and picked up the book
Speaker 1: when the police released it, and brought it back to
Speaker 1: New York, and we eventually sold it for Nick. The
Speaker 1: sentimental value of the comic was probably still there for Cage.
Speaker 1: Once someone falls for Superman, they tend to admire him. Forever,
Speaker 1: But by this point Cage's unusual approach to financial planning
Speaker 1: was well known. It involved spending. He admitted he loved
Speaker 1: spending money on homes and cars and rarities. There were
Speaker 1: reports he owned an island or two in the Bahamas.
Speaker 1: He owned a gulf Stream Jet, four yachts, at one point,
Speaker 1: fifty cars, and his own mechanic. A Tyrannosaurus skull was
Speaker 1: procured for two hundred and seven. The six thousand dollars
Speaker 1: then returned when it was found to have been stolen
Speaker 1: from Mongolia. Cage, of course, had no idea it was illicit.
Speaker 1: Buying hot dino bones was certainly expensive, but what really
Speaker 1: dampened cages spending was real estate. The market took a
Speaker 1: bad turn, and the many properties he had became difficult
Speaker 1: to maintain or sell off. Even the bell Air mansion
Speaker 1: where the comic was originally stolen went up for sale.
Speaker 1: Cage didn't have much of a choice. He had eighteen
Speaker 1: million dollars in loans against it. It did eventually sell
Speaker 1: for only a fraction of cages thirty five million dollar
Speaker 1: asking price, so Superman would have to be a savior.
Speaker 1: In another way, Cage returned the money to the insurance company,
Speaker 1: and then he put the comic up for auction with
Speaker 1: Stephen Fishler. They submitted the book to the c g
Speaker 1: C The Last Word in third Party Comic Book Grading,
Speaker 1: where it received a nine out of ten at the time,
Speaker 1: the highest ever awarded an action number one. In November
Speaker 1: of two thousand eleven, the book fetched an incredible two
Speaker 1: point one six one million dollars, a new record for
Speaker 1: a comic book sale, which undoubtedly helped Cage attend to
Speaker 1: at least a portion of his debt. This truly was
Speaker 1: divine providence. The comic found a new home with an
Speaker 1: undisclosed buyer, one who would presumably take more precautions than
Speaker 1: Cage had in safe keeping it. Mark and Sylvester were
Speaker 1: off the hook. Sylvester had seemed to materialize on the
Speaker 1: auction scene suddenly, and after the comic deal turned sour,
Speaker 1: he seemed to disappear just as quickly. Here's Laura Dotson.
Speaker 1: Yet it was something like, how often does this happen?
Speaker 1: And we came across this and we just don't know
Speaker 1: how to sell it or get it appraised, And this
Speaker 1: just fell into our lap from these units we've been
Speaker 1: buying and I'm thinking, well, here comes another fantastic treasure
Speaker 1: hunt story. And as quick as he came onto the
Speaker 1: picture in the scene, I had never seen him again either.
Speaker 1: There are questions left dangling. Did Mark really happen to
Speaker 1: call Stephen Fishler by pappenstance? Did Sylvester really find the
Speaker 1: comic in a storage locker? If he did, who did
Speaker 1: the locker belong to? Stephen doesn't think there is an
Speaker 1: original owner. I believe that they concocted the story as
Speaker 1: a plausible cover, so they went all right, usual, I've
Speaker 1: got this book. I'll just say it came from a
Speaker 1: storage unit. That'll be it. But I don't I don't
Speaker 1: really believe that that was the case. But where the
Speaker 1: book was, if I was to put together reasonable details,
Speaker 1: left Nick's house. The person who stole it out of
Speaker 1: the house sold it, and may have sold it to
Speaker 1: the individual who had it all these years, who I
Speaker 1: met and wanted a million dollars for. I don't think
Speaker 1: it bounced around for many people. However, many people it
Speaker 1: bounced around with. It landed with Sylvester and Mark. Sylvester
Speaker 1: virtually disappeared and Mark Well Mark was already in some trouble,
Speaker 1: trouble that ended tragically and under some slightly suspicious circumstances.
Speaker 1: To try to make sense of it, We're going back
Speaker 1: to the warehouse, this time from the perspective of the
Speaker 1: people who worked there. We're going to get more help
Speaker 1: from a reformed art thief. And yes, we're going to
Speaker 1: see if we can find the elusive Sylvester and see
Speaker 1: if he is finally ready to talk. But please don't
Speaker 1: john me. As a current joined us called tweetcau as well,
Speaker 1: that's next time on the finale of Stealing Superman. Stealing
Speaker 1: Superman is written by Jake Rawson, sound design, scoring and
Speaker 1: mixing by Josh Fisher, additional editing by Jonathan Washington, original
Speaker 1: music by Aaron Kaufman, mixing and mastering by Baheed Fraser.
Speaker 1: Research and fact checking by Jake Rawson and Austin Thompson,
Speaker 1: with production support from Lulu Philip. Show logo by Lucy Quintinia.
Speaker 1: Our executive producer is Jason English and I'm your host
Speaker 1: Danish Sports. If you're enjoying this show, check out Haileywood
Speaker 1: and Noble Blood and give us a nice review. We'll
Speaker 1: see you next week. Five