Prosecutor asks judge to revisit thieves’ sentences

The punishment for two men who admitted cannibalizing rare books at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh and selling maps, photographs and art prints does not fit the gravity of their crimes, a prosecutor argued in a Friday court filing.

Deputy District Attorney Brian Catanzarite asked Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Alexander P. Bicket to refashion the home confinement sentences he imposed a week ago Friday on John Schulman, 56, of Squirrel Hill and Greg Priore, 64, of Oakland.

Judge Bicket told the defendants that, had it not been for the COVID-19 pandemic, their sentences would have been “more impactful.”

In his motion, Mr. Catanzarite wrote that if Judge Bicket would sentence the two men to “total confinement,” he would not object to suspending their home confinement until the judge, “is satisfied that the risk of infection is substantially low enough for these defendants to be lodged safely.”

A prison term, the prosecutor wrote, would reflect “the serious and atypical nature of the offenses to which they pleaded guilty.” Last week, Mr. Catanzarite asked the judge to sentence both men to two to four years in state prison.

Judge Bicket sentenced Schulman to home confinement for four years and Priore for three years. The judge also ordered that neither man, nor their immediate family members, can profit from any books, movies or

radio shows the case inspires. Any profits, the judge ordered, must go into a trust and be made available to victims of the theft.

Schulman and Priore are electronically monitored by ankle bracelets and will be on probation for 12 years. They can leave home for employment, worship and medical appointments.

Schulman continues to operate Caliban Book Shop in Oakland; his wife, Emily Hetzel, runs an online business called Common Crow Books. For 25 years, Priore was the lone archivist in charge of the library’s rare book room until more than 300 items were discovered missing in April 2017. Priore was fired a few weeks later.

The prosecutor noted that Judge Bicket recognized the gravity of the theft. A senior appraiser for Pall Mall Art Advisors valued the library’s loss at $8 million. Travelers Insurance paid the Carnegie Library $6.57 million for its loss.

“The history of our nation was stolen and resold merely to feed the defendants’ avarice,” Mr. Catanzarite wrote. “... Priore and Schulman plundered irreplaceable cultural treasures for which money provides no substitute.”

Travis McDade, a lawyer and librarian, teaches at the University of Illinois College of Law in Champaign, Ill. He is the author of four books about major rare book thefts from public and university libraries.

“While this is the sort of case often handled at the federal instead of state level, the investigation and prosecution here was nothing short of excellent. I just wish that effort, not to mention protection of our cultural heritage, had received a more appropriate sentence,” Mr. McDade wrote in an email.

Mr. McDade praised the prosecutor’s legal argument that the judge could split the men’s sentences into home confinement, probation and time in prison when he deems it’s safe to do so.

The Carnegie Library case reminds Mr. McDade of Forbes Smiley III, a collector and dealer who served 3½ years in federal prison for stealing 97 rare maps valued at more than $3 million. Smiley stole from at least seven libraries, including the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale University.

Mr. Catanzarite cited the Smiley case in his sentencing memo.

Smiley first pleaded guilty in federal court, then again to the same crime in state court in New Haven, Conn. He served most of his federal sentence. A state court judge sentenced him to five years in prison, but his federal court sentence was concurrent with the state sentence, Mr. McDade said.

Recent library thefts have drawn long sentences. Barry M. Landau, who pleaded guilty to stealing documents from three historical societies or museums, received a seven-year federal prison sentence in 2012.

In 2004, four male college students at Transylvania University in Lexington, Ky., received seven-year federal prison terms for tasering a librarian and tying her up, then stealing rare books from the school’s library. A documentary, “American Animals,” examined the motivations for their crime.

In an email, Robert Del Greco, a lawyer for Schulman, wrote, “We have reviewed the motion and will file a response in due course.”

Patrick M. Livingston, a lawyer for Priore, said, “We have just received it and continue to review it.”