Man jailed after stealing £270,000 Banksy print to pay off historic drug debt

A man who stole a Banksy print from an art gallery to pay off a historic drug debt has been jailed for 13 months.

Larry Fraser, 49, stole limited edition prints belonging to street artist Girl with Balloon The series debuts at the Grove Gallery in Fitzrovia, central London, in September 2024.

The artwork was part of an exhibition at the gallery showcasing a collection of 13 Banksy pieces worth £1.5 million, and was quickly rescued by officers from the Metropolitan Police’s Flying Squad.

Kingston Crown Court heard Fraser, who pleaded guilty to one count of theft, may be entitled to immediate release due to time spent on an electronic curfew.

Sentencing him on Friday, Judge Anne Brown said: “This is a brazen and serious form of non-domestic burglary.”

Prosecutor Philip Stott told the court he saw on CCTV the defendant, who lives in Beckton, east London, waiting outside the gallery for about 10 minutes on September 8 last year and then repeatedly smashing the glass door with a heavy, blunt object.

When Fraser entered the building around 11 p.m., he said he went directly to the artwork, which was a signed and numbered print.

Mr Stott said: “The defendant was taken to a location in London Docklands and the artwork was stored inside a building there.

“He was later rescued by a third party on September 12, shortly after information was passed to the police.”

He said the value of the print, which was returned undamaged, was around £270,000.

A second man, 54-year-old James Love, was cleared of stealing the print following a trial after he was accused of being the getaway driver in the burglary.

The court heard Fraser put forward a defense in which he stated he owed money to others for a historic drug debt he was trying to pay off and agreed to commit the offense “under some degree of duress and fear”.

He said he did not know the target of the theft and did not know its value until the day of the crime.

Judge Brown said: “Although you did not know the exact value of the prints, you clearly understood that it was very valuable.”

He added: “I’m sure there was a high level of planning, but this was not your plan.”

He said the offense was “too serious” to warrant a suspended sentence.

The court heard that Fraser had 18 previous convictions, the most recent of which was in 2002 when he was jailed for theft and unlawful wounding, and that he had been “out of trouble” since his release from prison in 2008.

Jeffrey Israel, defending, said Fraser, who lived with his mother as his mother’s main carer, had managed to “break the cycle of drug addiction” after his latest prison sentence.

He said it would “require bold advocacy” to argue that the value of oppression had increased because of what had happened to it, but added: “That’s probably the truth.”

Detective Chief Inspector Scott Mather, of the Met Police’s Flying Squad, said: “Banksy’s Balloon Girl is known around the world and we took immediate action to bring Fraser to justice, while also reuniting the artwork with the gallery.

“The speed with which this happened is a testament to the tireless work of Flying Squad officers; in total it only took four days for normality to be restored.”

Grove Gallery director Lindor Mehmetaj (29) thanked the police for saving the work.

He said: “When the Flying Team showed me the actual artwork I was completely, very positively shocked.

“It is very difficult to put into words the weight that has been lifted off your shoulders.

“The way they deal with this problem from the moment they step on stage: pragmatic, logical, extremely calm and extremely professional.

“But it is also remarkable that the artwork was recovered after it was stolen from us.”