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The Missing Madonna: The Dramatic Pursuit of Stolen Art in a Tale of Deception and Intrigue

In the BBC’s “The Missing Madonna,” they retell the heist of a da Vinci painting In this podcast, we explore Britain’s biggest art theft, and the hunt for the stolen painting. — The Madonna of the Yarnwinder It offers a sweeping, sensationalist overview of the heist; how it was solved and what happened in its aftermath.

The tale starts with a grand heist at Drumlanrig Castle. A pair of men — pretending to be just another couple of tourists — carry out a bold assault on the unsuspecting guide. Making a clean and brief hijacking, they took possession of an irreplaceable work of art before fleeing the scene in a white Volkswagen Golf that was beaten up, then left behind pandemonium. Even as police launch an investigation, and offer a hefty reward, the multi-million-pound portrait disappears into the criminal underworld. The Duke of Buccleuch, the owner of art work, is left hoping that it will be returned eventually.

It would be years before a glimmer of hope appeared or some miracle mile-breakthrough on Merseyside, when the magnum opus ostensibly resurfaces. A stranger enters a pub in Liverpool and approaches Robbie Graham and Jack Doyle, the men who ran StolenStuffReunited.com. These two long-time friends and business partners, who also operate the private investigation company Crown Private Investigations, view this as a possible way to make history and win a lucrative payout. It seems that their investigation is moving in the right direction, as Robbie and Jack recruit a list of heavy-hitters to help them retrieve the painting. But their journey is fraught with a series of unexpected twists & turns, culminating in an anxiety-inducing encounter in a village pub car park. The private investigators themselves encounter a multitude of surprising obstacles, the culmination of which they could never have predicted.

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Feature Image Courtesy: BBC