Original subtitles

(suspenseful music)

It's January, 2006.

(upbeat music)

Police officers from Vienna's Crime Investigation squad

arrive on the outskirts of a forest.

For almost three years, they've been working

to try to recover one of the most important sculptures

in Renaissance art, the "Saliera" by Benvenuto Cellini.

It had been stolen from Vienna's History of Art Museum

during the night, and was worth a cool $65 million dollars.

But was it just another dead end?

The thief had already sent two blackmail letters,

and led the police on a wild goose chase through Vienna,

leaving handwritten clues as he went.

The extraordinary trail of the stolen "Saliera"

would turn out to be one of the most astonishing

art heists in modern times.

(police siren blaring)

(upbeat music)

(classical music)

It's late evening in Vienna,

and there's a festive spirit in the city.

Skaters are enjoying a last few circuits at the rink

in front of the town hall, before they close for the night.

(gentle music)

By the early hours, the crowds have gone home.

The streets in the city center are deserted.

(suspenseful music)

At the prestigious Museum of Art History nearby,

the security night shift has been on duty for several hours.

The museum houses one of the greatest

art collections in Europe,

and is a focal point for culture in Vienna.

Many of the artworks here are priceless.

It's on par with both the Louvre

and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.

It is the focal point of not just the great collections

of the Habsburg Emperors and others,

but also it's the cultural focal point of a great city.

Protecting such an important

collection is critical.

The museum has state of the art security,

but like any large building, it can still be vulnerable.

Intruder alarm systems, electronics,

they don't stop thieves, that's not enough.

You also need a building, a structure

with a very burglarproof outer shell.

It must be very difficult to get in.

Because investments in electronics are a waste of money

if people can get in quickly and get out quickly again.

It doesn't stop thieves.

At 3:55 a.m. something catches the attention

of one of the security guards.

He notices a small window alarm

is activated on the 7th floor.

It continues to ring for another 40 seconds.

Assuming it's a false alarm,

he switches it off and resets it.

The alarm having been triggered,

and the people in the security room being aware

of the fact the alarm's been triggered,

then turn it off because they reckon it's malfunctioned.

And this is a fairly typical thing to happen.

In my own experience, it's happened a number of times,

where security personnel are not well paid

and they're there on night duty.

And they assume, because it happened so often

that false alarms happen,

that this is just another false alarm.

(suspenseful music)

The rest of the night passes quietly.

At eight o'clock in the morning, the guards

leave their control room and start to check the galleries.

As they reach the 7th floor, this is what confronts them.

First a smashed window, with glass littering the floor.

Then in the middle of the gallery,

a cabinet with a glass surround that's also been broken.

But the unique Renaissance sculpture

that had been protected inside, has gone.

The missing sculpture is called

the "Saliera" or "Salt Cellar".

It's the only surviving gold work

by the extraordinary Renaissance artist,

Benvenuto Cellini, made around 1543.

It's insurance value is $65 million dollars.

It's extremely important

because it's a one-of-a-kind piece of art.

It came from Cellini, in the Italian Renaissance.

And there's no other piece of art exactly like it.

And that's why it was such a tremendous shock

when this invaluable,

this priceless piece of art was stolen.

(suspenseful music)

The discovery of the theft was catastrophic

for the museum, the sculpture was unique.

A hugely important work of art.

And it's loss might now impact on Vienna's

profitable art and culture tourism.

So much of Austrian tourism revolves around culture.

And art is a big part of the culture here.

And if somebody stole the "Saliera",

theoretically it might give somebody ideas

of stealing something else, a Klimt or a Schiele.

And the Austrian authorities, the politicians

and the tourist industry especially,

didn't want this to get out.

And so it was imperative that the police

find who committed this crime.

(police siren blaring)

Within minutes of the discovery

the Austrian police are en route to the museum.

(dramatic music)

As Vienna wakes, news of the audacious theft

of one of the key works of Renaissance art,

from Austria's greatest museums, is about to break.

(dramatic music)

We didn't realize how worth this sculpture was.

The next day, it was the Monday, the newspapers

wrote that it is 50 million euros worth.

With that, it's the biggest theft,

art theft in Austria we had, ever.

It was extremely momentous in the fact

that it opened up a whole plethora of questions

in itself, how did this happen?

How could this have happened?

Why wasn't the security better?

What was going on in the leadership of the museum?

And how were the police going to deal with it?

It was now crucial for the police

to work out how the thief or thieves

had got into the museum and onto the 7th floor.

As well as that, they needed to piece together

the last 24 hours, in a search for suspects.

(men speaking in foreign language)

The night of the theft had been

an unusually busy evening in Vienna.

(gentle music)

Throughout the evening and into the early hours,

the center of Vienna had been full of revelers.

The city had put on a festival

called "The Long Night of Music".

In front of the town hall, hundreds of skaters

were enjoying the big night out.

Well if there's an atmosphere like that,

the people are skating, having fun enjoying themselves,

then very often burglaries take place.

(suspenseful music)

So it seems thieves make use of that.

They do their risk assessment.

I think in general, thieves are better

in risk assessment then museums.

The Art History Museum had also stayed open

much later then normal,

finally closing it's doors at 1:50 a.m.

At 2 a.m., the night alarms were set,

but there had been problems before, with false alarms.

One thing that's killing for a system,

is it's frequent false alarms.

Because then people won't react anymore

if you have false alarms all the time.

Look in the streets if there are alarms in cars,

nobody will react because you hear them very often.

So false alarms really are killing for the system.

And there was another unusual factor

at the History of Art Museum that night.

Huge renovation work meant the back of the building

had been covered in scaffolding, right up to the 7th floor.

The police thought they were now able to track

just how the thief got in, and at what time.

The next morning, they staged a carefully planned

reconstruction of the theft, using a police officer

and evidence they'd found on the scaffolding.

They needed to time how long it would take

to get in and out of the museum.

Moving to the back of the building,

the thief was able to get onto the first scaffolding ladder.

Now he carefully climbs up to the first floor

and accesses a second ladder.

From there, he moves on up to the 3rd floor,

the 4th, until finally he is at the 7th.

Well when we put up scaffolding normally,

we make sure there will be alarm systems

on the scaffolding.

So as soon as somebody climbs the scaffolding,

there should be an alarm.

They didn't even protect the scaffolding.

So this is what I call this ladder,

it's just a ladder they put outside, through building.

Almost an invitation, please get in.

Now he can skirt round the building

on the scaffold boards, until finally he reaches

the 7th floor window outside the Raphael room.

It's taken him four minutes.

He rips away the sheeting in front of the window

and realizes there are two windows.

One inside and one outside.

The window alarm goes off,

and the security guard is alerted.

But he does nothing, instead he simply resets the alarm.

Not even the lights are switched on.

The lights on the gallery would've enabled

the CCTV cameras to show what had happened.

(dramatic music)

Now the intruder heads straight for the glass

cabinet covering the "Saliera".

He smashed it, takes the sculpture

and goes out through the same windows.

He's been inside the museum for 55 seconds.

The room is monitored by three motion detector alarms.

And there is also a camera.

When the police check it, they see nothing.

It was too dark to even have registered an image.

He now exits the building, but this time

by another route on the scaffolding.

(dramatic music)

What became apparent was, is that you were dealing

with a highly athletic individual.

Somebody who had a lot of courage.

Somebody who was able to get behind this netting

and to get up two or three storeys

to get through a relatively small window.

Break through this window, jimmy this window open.

Jump down to where the floor was, to break this case.

And then to go all the way back, up to the window

and back down again, while carrying this priceless

piece of Renaissance art.

The access and route into the building seems clear,

but the security guards' failure to react

to the window alarm, now puts them right at the center

of the police investigation.

Was it simple negligence, or did the thief

have an accomplice inside the museum?

I was there professionally, and my instincts

were straight away, there's something wrong here

with the response to the alarm.

And I leapt to the conclusion

that that's where the trouble must lie.

That was my instinctive thing,

was there's got to be something wrong

with the alarm system procedures.

Got to be, and the people managing them.

One must not forget that a high percentage

of all thefts from museums are insider thefts.

In the FBI they did a research a few years ago

and they said of all thefts from museums,

that they solve, so not all thefts but all thefts

that they solve, 80% and that's a lot,

80%'s insider thefts.

The police interview every security guard.

They monitor their phone calls and put them

under close surveillance, but turn up nothing.

By now, news of the theft, and the police investigation

is dominating the media in Austria.

Much of the criticism is leveled at the museum security,

who are now offering a $75,000 dollar reward

for the return of the "Saliera".

But the police are also under huge pressure

to make an arrest, and find the sculpture, undamaged.

Well people were amazed, because this was considered

to be such a brazen act.

One of the biggest art history museums in central Europe

that was supposed to have a great security system.

And along comes somebody, in the middle of the night.

Not only breaks into the museum, but steals

one of the showcase attractions inside this museum

and then disappears into the night, into thin air.

So far the police have no key suspects,

no clues and no idea where the "Saliera" was.

(cheerful classical music)

The colorful history of the "Salt Cellar" began in Florence,

in the first part of the 16th century.

It's creator was Benvenuto Cellini,

a Renaissance goldsmith whose life was beyond belief.

Amongst other things, he'd committed murder at least once,

and had numerous affairs with both men and women.

What's more, he reveled in his notoriety.

Well Benvenuto Cellini was one of the most colorful

characters of the Renaissance, and the reason we know this

is because he wrote an autobiography.

Which is a rather unusual thing

for a Renaissance artist to do.

And in that autobiography he gives us

a very vivid account of his life, his achievements

and he's certainly not a modest man, it has to be said.

But his achievements span everything from murder to love,

to artistic creativity, to ingenuity and invention.

He really does praise himself to the heights (laughs)

throughout his account of his life.

(gentle music)

The sculpture was one of the greatest examples

of late Renaissance art, and was designed for royalty.

But it wasn't just decorative.

The object is functional,

it was made as a salt cellar, and in fact

it has facility to have pepper on one side

and salt on the other.

But it is it's decorative qualities

that Cellini was most interested in.

And in fact, what he's demonstrating here

is his incredible skill in casting,

in particular casting in gold, and enameling with colors.

His travels took him to France,

which is where the "Saliera" began

it's journey across Europe, and finally to Vienna.

The "Saliera" was made for the king of France,

and it was given to the Archduke Leopold II,

as a diplomatic gift from the grandson of Francis I,

that was Charles IX, and so it ended up

in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.

But why was the "Saliera" so unique?

Well firstly, it's survival is very rare.

There are very few gold pieces that have survived

from the 16th century.

I think that technically, it's skill, the skill that Cellini

demonstrates through the technical virtuosity

of the piece, means that it represents the pinnacle

of technical skill, virtuosity.

And I think it's the marrying together

of that sort of virtuosity of skill,

with a rather sophisticated approach to image-making

as it were, coming out of the Florentine milieu

makes the piece rather unique and special.

(gentle music)

It's now just a week

since the "Saliera" was stolen.

But the police aren't the only ones feeling the pressure.

The museum authorities, reeling from the theft

and stunned by criticisms of their security,

decide to call in their own expert to help.

An ex-officer from Scotland Yard's Arts and Antiques squad.

The director of the museum rang me, and he asked me

would I come to Vienna and offer my advice to him.

He sounded quite distressed.

This is almost a killer blow to his psyche.

Charlie Hill was also intrigued

by the alarm system at the museum.

According to him, the infrared detectors

seemed to cover everything in the Raphael room,

apart from the "Saliera" in the center of the gallery.

When I was taken up to the Raphael gallery,

and looked at the point where the plinth was,

upon which the Cellini "Saliera" was fixed, and it's case.

I was astonished because the passive infrared detectors

had been set so that they actually went beyond the case,

the plinth on which the "Saliera" was being exhibited.

And so somebody coming in from the window,

who knew about alarms, would have realized that.

So that was the one thing that stuck in my mind,

there's something wrong here, seriously wrong.

But where did this leave the investigation?

It was intriguing information, but Charlie Hill

was already looking elsewhere.

He was convinced the "Saliera" theft

had all the hallmarks of organized crime.

His hunch was it had been ordered by warlords

from Serbia or Croatia.

My initial feeling, based on other experiences

over the years that I've been involved in recovering

works of art, is that in continental Europe,

the main thieves of priceless works of art

in the past couple of decades,

have been a variety of groups in the Balkans.

So not just Serbia, it's not just Kosovo Albanians,

or Albanians or any other particular group.

But by and large people you would call Balkan bandits.

But knowing the reward for the return

of the "Saliera" would be a good bargaining tool,

Hill now flew to Belgrade.

(suspenseful music)

Meetings were arranged, he'd been given names

of criminal high rollers who might know

where the "Saliera" was.

He felt he was getting closer.

I spoke to a number of people in Belgrade,

and I told them there was a reward for the piece.

You need to talk business with these guys,

they don't understand you if you don't talk seriously

to them and explain exactly what you want.

You also don't want to lie to them.

So you need something constructive to say

and then stick to your word.

And they all said that they'd be happy to help me

and used their contacts to see

what they could find out about it.

So that was quite helpful.

And sure enough I got a couple of phone calls,

well maybe this, maybe that.

But nothing ever particularly constructive,

nothing to work on.

The Austrian police meanwhile

were being swamped by leads from all over the world.

Including Serbia and Croatia in the Balkans.

We heard from Quebec

that the "Saliera" should be in Quebec, in Canada

or in Bulgaria, or in Croatia.

And somebody said that Italian Camorra has stolen it,

but still we didn't know

who had really the "Saliera".

But then something the police

had hoped for, happened.

On the 22nd of August, 2003, a letter, postmarked Vienna,

was sent to the headquarters of Uniqa,

the insurance company covering the "Saliera".

Inside was a ransom note.

5 million euros, or nearly $7 million dollars

for the return of the "Saliera".

The letter was typed in broken English.

There were also some small enamel fragments

that the writer said, came from the "Saliera".

The letter writer asked that the insurance company

place an ad in a national paper to signal

that they had received the letter and were prepared to pay.

Meanwhile tests were done on the enamel fragments

to discover if they were indeed part of the "Saliera".

The answer was they were.

So now the police realized they were dealing

with the real thief, but there was a problem.

If the insurance company involved the police,

then the "Saliera" would be melted down.

For the museum, people and the police,

it ratcheted up the pressure even further.

Because in these blackmail letters

he alluded to money, and he also alluded

to what he would do to the "Saliera"

if he didn't get the money.

And one of these threats was melting it down.

And this caused a great degree of anxiety

among museum officials, the police,

and again the cultural officials here in Austria.

And they wanted to do everything they possibly could

to prevent this man from carrying out this threat

to melting it down.

And they thought he was dead serious.

For Charlie Hill, the ransom letter

seemed to fit in with his theory

of a Serbian gang connection.

When I read the letter, it read so much,

'cause it was in English, but broken English.

It read in a manner that was very similar

to a letter I'd received from some art crook in Croatia,

some time before.

Just a matter of months before.

And that the English was so similar in it's broken form,

that I assumed, now I'm absolutely right

that it's gotta be a Balkan,

but maybe it's a Croatian rather then a Serb.

At the time they thought it had to part

of an international conspiracy,

that there had to be a team of very highly trained

and experienced art thieves who broke in,

who got this thing and took it out.

In response to the ransom note,

an ad was now placed in an Austrian newspaper.

It was the only chance the police could hope for,

to smoke out the thief.

But within hours, their plans were blown apart.

The Austrian media got wind of the ransom letter

and printed it.

Angry and suspicious, the letter writer responded

by saying he was now breaking off all contact.

From this moment on, we had about 150 policemen

that worked on this case.

The investigation seemed to have stalled.

The letter writer had gone underground

and Charlie Hill's investigation into crime gangs in Serbia

was still ongoing, but hadn't delivered a suspect.

Time was slipping by.

But back in Vienna, a chink of light was about to open up.

The Austrian police were about to get a second crack.

The "Saliera" thief was about to break cover again.

Well the police were under amazing pressure,

an astounding amount of pressure.

Because they had various parties putting pressure on them.

They had the media, they had the public,

they had the museum and they also had the politicians.

But then in 2005, another letter suddenly arrives.

Again to the insurance company in Vienna.

It's passed on to the police.

It includes a photograph of the "Saliera"

with a dated newspaper beside it.

The ransom money has now gone up to 10 million euros,

equivalent to $12 million dollars.

If they agree to pay, the letter writer instructs them

to put an ad in the paper, with the words,

"Darling, I'll be back soon",

along with a mobile phone number.

It's signed simply "cerveza", but there's a warning too.

Tell the police and the "Saliera" will be melted down.

The writer says no police, no detectives.

Only between him and the insurance.

But the insurance said to us,

it's your work, please make it.

Once he spots the ad,

the letter writer tightens the screw.

He now describes a place where part

of the "Saliera" has been hidden.

It's the only removable part, the trident or fork.

(suspenseful music)

As we found it behind this electricity box,

under the leaves in a nylon bag.

And then we knew that we have a piece of the "Saliera".

So now the police have the "Saliera" trident back,

but there were still no clues as to who

the mysterious "cerveza" was.

The thief's cat and mouse game

was about to move into a new phase.

(traffic humming)

The thief still believes he's dealing with

the insurance company, Uniqa, but it's the police

who have now taken over negotiations.

It's a high risk strategy.

He's already threatened to melt down the "Saliera"

if he discovers they're involved.

Now the Austrian police have to deliver the ransom money.

It'll be anything but straight forward.

The police are about to discover just how determined

and organized the thieves are.

Vienna itself would now become the focus

of an extraordinary cat and mouse game

that would push the police's nerves,

and the thieves, to the limit.

On November 7th, 2005, an SMS text message

comes through to a police mobile phone.

The number had been placed in the last ad

in response to the letter writer's instructions.

In the beginning of the November,

he sent us an SMS and he said, "Now it begins."

Again, the thief believed

he was dealing with just the insurance company.

(suspenseful music)

The message sets out clear instructions.

The money should be put into a backpack.

And the man wearing it should be in recognizable clothes.

He should also be on a bike.

The police assign this man, an undercover

police officer, for the drop-off.

His identity has to be protected.

It's 10 in the morning, the police plan to follow him.

As the undercover detective starts his journey

to the rendezvous, the atmosphere is tense.

No one knows for sure where this will end.

It's the thief or thieves who are now calling the shots.

All the police can do is run with the instructions

until they get a chance to make their move.

And the clock is ticking.

It was very melodramatic, and there was

this cat and mouse game because obviously

they were dealing with an intelligent individual.

But also an individual who was very cautious.

The location he's been told to go to is a bridge.

He's also been told he'll find a handwritten message there.

The message he gets, tells him to go

to yet another location nearby.

(dramatic music)

Again, he finds another message, and yet another location.

It's turning into a battle of nerves

for the police, and the thief.

We didn't know with whom we are dealing,

and so we were under real pressure, hard pressure.

(dramatic music)

Now he arrives at a bench,

across from the isle of Danube, but this time

the instructions are different.

He's told to wait another half and hour and do nothing.

It wasn't as straight forward as

you just dump the money here

and I'll drop the "Saliera" here.

So obviously you're dealing with a cunning individual.

Somebody who had thought this out

and who was being as cautious as he could be,

to get this money.

Now the psychological game kicks in.

(suspenseful music)

The police are convinced the thief is watching him nearby.

Half an hour passes.

The handwritten message now instructs him

to switch from his bike and catch a bus

from the city center station.

The journey takes him to the outskirts of Vienna.

His police colleagues are still trying

to follow his every move.

Getting off the bus, he now has to walk up a hill.

By now the backpack is starting to slow him down.

[Undercover Policeman] It's very heavy, about 25 kilos.

And if you had it on your back about for two or three hours,

your shoulders, you will have problems

with your shoulders and your feet.

He now has to pick up 4th handwritten message

from behind a monument.

(gently dramatic music)

Like the others, it's hidden under a stone

in a black plastic bag.

Again there are more instructions.

This time he has to walk 500 yards

up a small track to a church cross.

He has to wait again before picking up another message.

By this time the police are starting to feel the pressure.

The paper chase has been going on for five hours.

[Undercover Policeman] I was very nervous

because no one noticed what's going on now,

or how it will end.

And I was worried about that the contact

to my colleagues will be cut.

(suspenseful music)

He has to wait 10 minutes

before he can pick up the next message.

This time it's more explicit.

[Undercover Policeman] He say I should take my bag

and go to the wood, and I have to look for

a tree in a special position.

Now the end game seems to be in sight.

But no one can predict the outcome.

The policeman is told to head through a vineyard

and then into the woods.

He's told to look out for a clearing with two fallen trees.

There he finds a final message.

He has to put down the backpack

with the money still inside, and walk away.

But the police who've been following him

are too far behind and can't get to him in time.

He has to stall and buy time.

Finally he puts down the backpack

with the money inside, and moves off.

The money was there and they expected him

to come and get the money.

The police wait but nothing happens.

No one goes for the backpack.

But as the undercover policeman heads back,

he gets a final text message on his mobile.

It says, "Thank you for your help, we will be in touch."

All the police can do is recover the backpack.

It was a hammer blow for the police.

The trail had zigzagged across Vienna,

but they were no closer to catching the thief.

We felt very, very angry and bad,

because we have

laid down the rucksack with the money,

in the forest, and with everything done

what the thief wanted from us.

It smacks slightly of Keystone Coppery.

However, thinking about it,

it meant that the Austrian police really

were taking things seriously,

although they weren't being particularly successful.

That when those sorts of undercover operations

don't go successfully, they do smack of farce and disaster.

The police had put huge resources

into a manic paper chase around Vienna,

that after eight hours had got them nowhere.

They were convinced they'd been dealing with a thief,

but why had he pulled out at the last minute

and refused to pick up the backpack with the money?

The next morning the police had their answer.

They got another text message.

Although the police had stayed well out of sight,

the thief angrily accuses them of being involved

and refuses to negotiate anymore.

He was a little sharper then they were at this point

because he knew that they would nab him

if he tired to grab this money.

And so he backed away, and then you were back at square one.

Now the fear was that the "Saliera"

would be melted down and sold.

Most people, most journalists, myself included,

we thought we'll never find out what happened

to the "Saliera", or not in our lifetime.

But this time the text revealed something else.

For weeks now, the police had been trying to track

the mobile phone and sim card that the thief

was using to send his messages.

He'd changed his phone seven times already.

But now their luck was about to change.

To make his latest text, he changed his sim card.

Police realized it was different from the others.

The man who stole the "Saliera" made,

in this case, only one mistake.

And this was that he bought a sim card

for his phone in a shop in Vienna.

Now they threw all their resources

into trying to find the shop that had sold the sim card.

They tracked him down through the cell phone

that he had used, and they were able to,

as they say, walk the cat backwards.

And they found out which shop it was then.

They even had a receipt with a time stamp.

But it was going to get even better.

The shop had recently installed a state of the art

pinhole camera, no one could see it.

When the police analyzed the pictures

and matched the time on the camera

with the time on the receipt,

they realized they had their suspect on film.

They could see youthful looking middle aged man

buying a sim card.

He was also looking around to see if he could spot

any cameras, what's more the time matched.

The camera recorded the same time

as on the sim card receipt.

On this video there were only four person.

And the other three persons they were well known,

so we had only one man.

And we thought that he is this one

who has stolen the "Saliera".

But who was he?

On the 20th of January, 2006, the police held

a press conference and played pictures

of the man on the video.

(upbeat music)

They wanted the public to tell them if they recognized him.

One call took them completely by surprise.

At this press conference we said, this is the man

who has stolen the "Saliera", who knows him?

And then the first call that would be came, it was himself.

He said I am the man but I haven't anything to do with it.

The man identified himself as Robert Mang.

A 50 year old businessman living in Vienna.

He denied on the phone that he had anything

to do with the robbery, and he hardly fit the bill.

Robert Mang wasn't a career criminal.

His main business was actually installing alarms

and his personal history was quite interesting too.

He had been married and his wife left him

because he was having numerous affairs

with various women.

And afterwards he plunged into a midlife crises.

A little bit depressed, hanging out in bars.

Picking up various women.

Things didn't look good.

But Mang's connection

with an alarm business intrigued police.

His company was based in Vienna,

but what made matters more confusing

was that Charlie Hill was still convinced

there was a Serbian or Croatian gang behind the robbery.

But Robert Mang didn't fit his bill either.

The first thought that went through my mind

was Mang, Mang, where the hell

does a name like Mang come from?

All I could think of was (laughs) some kind of Ming

from a comic book of the 20th century.

And I genuinely, and I'm ashamed to admit,

thought Mang, Mang, now what part of the Balkans

does a name like that come from?

Or is it Hungarian? (laughs)

I just wasn't sure, that was truthfully

the first thought that went through my mind.

(suspenseful music)

The police had discovered Robert Mang

owned a vacation home an hour and a half from Vienna.

It was in an isolated village called Brand.

Robert Mang continued to deny he was the thief,

but so far the police hadn't confronted him face-to-face.

Now they decided to do just that.

Armed with a warrant to search his house,

six police officers headed towards Brand.

It was January 2006.

The "Saliera" had been missing for almost three years.

Mang was now their only suspect.

The problem was he just didn't fit

the profile of an art thief.

He was there and he bought a sim card, that's right.

Nothing was fitting about him.

When they arrived at his house,

Robert Mang was calm and polite.

Still insisting they had the wrong man.

And his behavior, very smart, like clever.

And we confronted him with the picture

and he said I am Mang, what do you want?

And a colleague said, you are the thief,

you have stolen the "Saliera", give it to us.

And he said what have I done?

I don't know.

Even the police were beginning

to have their doubts as Mang continued

to answer their questions.

Behavior it was very cool, it was very cool,

he was not nervous.

And the doubts was, is he the right man?

But then a discovery was made.

In the house the police found handwritten notes

in German, they seemed to refer to the ransom plan

and included references to amounts of money.

More then that, the handwriting looked very similar

to the handwritten notes found by the police,

under stones around Vienna.

The evidence was starting to pile up.

Mang was now arrested, suddenly his bravado evaporated.

We arrested him and then we said,

look, we have several things

that we know that you are the thief.

And he said to us, I must think about it.

(somber music)

In an extraordinary admission,

Mang now told the incredulous police

that he would take them to where the "Saliera" was buried.

Behind Mang's house in Brand, there was a large forest.

With Mang's directions, these police officers

arrived on the outskirts.

Could they finally be close to unraveling the mystery

of the stolen "Saliera"?

Armed with a shovel, they approached

the spot Mang pointed out.

That day there was heavy snow on the ground.

One of the police officers had a mobile phone camera.

As they started digging, he filmed what happened next.

(men speaking in foreign language)

It was astonishing footage,

and this is the first time it's ever been shown.

Slowly they uncover what seems to be a metal box.

(gentle music)

As the box was lifted out, everyone held their breath.

Wow. (laughs)

We have it.

Unbelievably, Robert Mang, there on the left,

posed with the police, he was smiling, and so were they.

It was a good feeling

because we are very proud at this moment.

But it's little bit doubt because what is inside the box?

The box couldn't be opened on the ground,

in case they lost forensic evidence or damaged it.

So they still didn't know if the "Saliera" was inside.

It was now taken back to the History of Art Museum

and carefully opened.

Inside they found Cellini's 16th century masterpiece,

without the trident of course.

It was an incredible moment.

Absolutely, you could hear

an expulsion of breath all over Vienna,

that they got the thing back.

And of course not only the police,

but also the museum and also the politicians

and the tourist industry.

Cellini's 16th century Salt Cellar

already had an extraordinary history.

Made around 1543 by one of the world's most colorful

and eccentric artists, presented as a gift

to Charles I of France.

And then in 1570, handed to the Habsburgs

as a marriage present.

Because of the rarity of Cellini's object

and because of his own personal fame,

and his very colorful personality.

The Salt Cellar has taken on I think, elements

of Cellini's persona and I think that it's become

very important to European culture as a consequence.

Therefore it's disappearance I think,

may have been quite traumatic.

Not only for the people at the Kunsthistorisches Museum

but indeed for Vienna and perhaps for Europeans in general.

Now after two years, hidden under the bed of Robert Mang,

and several weeks buried in the Viennese woods.

Cellini's "Saliera", his only surviving work in gold

was about to face the world again.

And this time to even greater acclaim and mythic status.

The piece itself is magnificent.

It would have been such a disaster to have lost it.

And so the recovery of it was highly significant

and an important milestone in the general wellbeing

of the city and the people and for all art lovers

who have an interest at all

in the great pieces of Western art.

The people who lives art sculptures,

know the "Saliera" all over the world.

And it was very important for the Austrian art and culture.

And the theft,

made a big space in the Austrian history.

Robert Mang was now formally charged.

It had taken three years of hard investigative slog,

but the Austrian police had succeeded

in getting the "Saliera" back,

and nailed the man who stole it.

It was a moment to savor.

We all said that it was a hard work,

but now we finished it.

The investigative application of the police in Vienna

was outstanding because they just kept at it and kept at it.

And although the man himself, that they were sure

they're after, was at least half a dozen times,

a step ahead of them.

On the 7th time, he wasn't.

And the reason on the 7th time,

he wasn't is 'cause they stuck with him.

And that speaks volumes about their professional abilities

and perseverance that you can only admire.

(gentle music)

For Charlie Hill, the arrest of Robert Mang

had ended once and for all his theory

that a Balkan crime gang was behind the theft.

It was an investigative line

that hit the mother of all dead ends.

Well I'm conceited and arrogant enough

to think that I more often get things right

in my chosen field, then wrong.

I regret that I got this wrong,

that I went off essentially on a tangent

with my preoccupations about organized criminal gangs

and banditry and the sort of things they get up to,

and why they get up to them.

Particularly when it comes to art thefts,

major art thefts.

But what no one could understand

was the motive behind the theft.

(upbeat music)

One day he saw a group of women, tourists

walking around central Vienna,

and he decided to follow this group of women, young women.

Hoping to strike up a conversation with at least

one of these young women.

And he followed them into this art museum.

And he's following them through the art museum,

and they get into the room where the "Saliera" is,

and Mang notices the alarm systems.

And he says to himself, these alarm systems

are completely out of date.

And they've got this thing here

being guarded by these kinds of alarms?

And he's thinking to himself,

it would be like taking candy from a baby, basically.

I think it was an adventure for him.

Because one week before the theft happened

he was in the museum, and he said,

oh it's a fine thing, the "Saliera" is so beautiful.

I want to have it.

And so one week later,

he sat, drank some beers and whiskey,

and he climbed on the scaffold and stole it.

(gentle music)

In 2006, Robert Mang stood trial

for the theft of the "Saliera".

He was sentenced to four years,

although the court found him not guilty

of trying to extort money.

But there was an astonishing twist

that brought Robert Mang back into the spotlight,

while he languished in jail.

He attracted a lot of attention,

especially female attention.

Because many people considered him this daring

and dashing figure who acted on his own.

When at the time of the theft, people are talking

about a team of heist experts, criminal masterminds.

But here was one guy who did it on his own.

He's a man in his 50s, looks much younger,

quite attractive to the ladies.

And women were sending him their phone numbers

along with other intimate details, saying we're interested.

Yes, we heard about it,

that he has a lot of fan mail in the prison.

A lot of women said that he is a very smart man.

And they wanted to talk with him,

and to live with him. (laughs)

Eventually I got a laugh when it turned out

that he was so endearing to a number of Austrian matrons.

They were sending him their underwear when he was in prison

on remand and so forth.

Because they thought he was their kinda guy.

Well the whole thing was just

so appalling it was actually amusing.

But thankfully the outstanding job the Austrian police

had done was such that the peace was back

and this guy's locked up, although it was not for long.

I just wonder what he'll do when he gets out.

(gentle music)

In court Robert Mang had described his actions

that night in 2003 as a prank.

Some prank.

It had lasted almost three years,

and nearly led to the loss of one of the world's

greatest Renaissance sculptures.

The story behind the "Saliera" theft

might even have made it's creator, Benvenuto Cellini, smile.

(upbeat music)