By BERNARD ORSMAN
They came in the dead of night for a valuable ancient gold frog from South America, smashing their way through three sets of doors at the Auckland Museum.
What they got was a worthless replica.
The latest theft will embarrass museum director Dr Rodney Wilson, who pledged to keep national treasures safe after a $65,000 Goldie painting was stolen five months ago.
But the thieves are also in the embarrassing position of having risked jail for a model worth less than a cup of coffee.
The museum is now considering installing steel doors after the thieves smashed through three sets of wooden and glass doors to steal what they thought was a pre-Columbian gold frog about 1.05 am.
The original frog was in secure storage and in its place was a worthless alloy replica, which had been on show for about 30 years.
The original was made in the Panama area between AD 800 and 1200 and could be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars on the international market. It was donated by Governor Sir George Grey.
The frog was to be put on display about a year ago when the museum was refurbished, but was kept in storage because it was considered too tempting for thieves.
In their raid yesterday, the thieves jemmied open a heavy wooden door on the western side of the museum and smashed through a toughened glass door and then a glass fire-door to reach the Civilisations Gallery on the ground floor.
Once inside the gallery, 20m in a straight line from the wooden door, they smashed a small hole in the toughened glass of a display cabinet and removed the frog. Nothing else was stolen.
As soon as the thieves entered the building, alarm bells rang and two security guards on duty rang the police and fire brigade.
The thieves passed a security camera and yesterday police were looking at footage for clues.
The robbery was over in minutes.
"There was a straight trail to the gold frog and a straight trail out again," Dr Wilson said.
"It looks to us very much as if they knew what they wanted."
He said the incident showed the need for another layer of security in the form of steel doors and a proper security control room.
Auckland Museum has only a handful of replica items on display. They include items that could deteriorate on show, objects that could attract thieves, like gold and firearms, and pieces that filled gaps in the museum's collections.
Chris Devereaux, of Webb's auctioneers, said pre-Columbian art referred to objects made before the discovery of the Americas by Christopher Columbus in 1492. Because the Spaniards melted down a lot of gold objects for bullion, pre-Columbian gold was highly sought after and rarely came on the market.
He said the original 120mm-long gold frog could be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Detective Senior Sergeant Julian Rinckes said he did not know how many people were involved in the theft or exactly how long it took. The police were examining closed- circuit television footage and waiting on forensic results for clues.
As well as the two thefts from the Auckland Museum, a 13th century Mongol helmet worth up to $250,000 was stolen from Canterbury Museum last February and a career criminal, Anthony Sannd, stole a 19th century French painting by James Tissot from the Auckland Art Gallery at gunpoint in August 1998.
The Goldie, the Tissot and the helmet were all recovered.
Thieves hop it with golden pond phony
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