Robin Symes

Robin Symes
Born	February 1939 (age 78)
Citizenship	British
Partner(s)	Christo Michaelides (died 1999)

Robin Symes (born February 1939) is a now-disgraced British antiquities dealer who was unmasked as a key player in an international criminal network that traded in looted archaeological treasures. Symes and his long-term partner Christo Michaelides met and formed a business partnership in the 1970s, and Symes became one of Britain's most prominent and successful antiquities dealers. However, after Michaelides died accidentally in 1999, his family took legal action to recover his share of the Symes company's assets, and when the matter went to trial, Symes was found to have lied in his evidence about the extent and value of his property; he was subsequently charged with and convicted of contempt of court, and sentenced to two years' imprisonment. Ongoing investigations by Italian authorities revealed in January 2016 that Symes' involvement in the illegal antiquities trade was even more extensive than previously thought, and that he had hidden a vast hoard of looted antiquities in 45 crates at the Geneva Freeport storage warehouse in Switzerland for 15 years, in order to conceal them from Michaelides' family.

Called "London’s best-known and most successful dealer in antiquities", Symes is also accused of playing a pivotal role in the illegal trade of looted antiquities, which is detailed in Peter Watson and Cecilia Todeschini's 2006 book The Medici Conspiracy: The Illicit Journey of Looted Antiquities from Italy's Tomb Raiders to the World's Greatest Museums. According to the accusations brought against Symes, he was the main dealer in Giacomo Medici's operation, selling looted antiquities from Robert E. Hecht and Medici to many renowned Western museums. One of the main museums to be involved was the J. Paul Getty Museum, whose curator Marion True has since been indicted for illegal trafficking of antiquities. She had been a student of Dietrich von Bothmer, curator of the Metropolitan Museum in New York. The Metropolitan acquired the Euphronios krater, which was returned to Italy in February 2006.

Symes' downfall was the result of a conflict with the family of his late partner Christo Michaelides, son and heir to the Papadimitriou shipping family. After Michaelides died from injuries sustained in an accidental fall while on holiday in 1999, a conflict arose over the assets of the partnership. Incensed by Symes' dismissive attitude, his refusal to return valuable personal effects, his repeated denials (later proven to be false) that the Papadimitriou family had any involvement in the partnership, and his assertion that all Christo's assets were his by right of inheritance, the Papdimitriou family determined to pursue the matter at any cost.

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