Shakespeare folio theft suspect feeling ‘persecuted’
Nov 10 2008 by Paul Loraine, The Journal
THE man suspected of stealing a £15m Shakespeare work said he feels persecuted after being arrested and bailed for the second time.
Raymond Scott, 51, was en route to London with boxes of books he planned to give to Oxfam and Amnesty shops when detectives arrested him at Darlington.
It was the second time the antiques dealer had been picked up in connection with the theft of the first folio edition from Durham University Library in 1998.
He was first questioned in July after he took a first folio edition which experts believed to be the stolen copy to the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC, in the United States, to be verified.
The library’s experts tipped off the police, leading to a worldwide manhunt involving the Durham force and America’s Federal Bureau of Investigation and, subsequently, a raid on Mr Scott’s North East home.
He was due to answer bail tomorrow but Mr Scott, who lives with his 80-year-old mother in Wigeon Close, Washington, was re-arrested on Thursday as he travelled on a National Express coach to London.
Mr Scott said: “They came early on Thursday morning to my house – or my mother’s house.
“She had just finished delivering me to Washington Galleries bus station because I was en route to taking books down to London for Amnesty and Oxfam. When she got back the detectives were there asking for me.
“I received a telephone call at Chester-le-Street and when the bus stopped at Darlington, the detective came on board and arrested me. It was all very civilised – I went quietly.”
After being released on bail pending further inquiries on Friday, Mr Scott reaffirmed his claims the copy he took to the Folger Library was one he acquired from a contact in Cuba.
He also expressed confidence that he would escape charges and cited a lack of detail in the evidence used against him.
Mr Scott said: “They started to go over the same ground.
“As a result of the four months of digging, they had some new lines of inquiry. They had gathered more evidence about my movements. I’ve been to Cuba three times this year and they wanted to know what I was doing on the other times in Cuba.
“It’s all much ado about nothing actually.
“They showed me the expert reports prepared by the experts in America comparing the two copies. I was very pleasantly surprised in what I would say was a lack of detail.
“What they presented was a case for the prosecution – the copies had been compared, but not contrasted.
“The problem they have is that they can’t positively identify the book that was stolen from Durham as the one I took into the Folger Shakespeare Library.
“So, when you ask me how I’m feeling, I suppose I’m feeling persecuted.
“I haven’t made any kind of a complaint, it’s all been very gentlemanly.
“But now we are trying to gather back the items that were seized from us.”
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