"A man has been sentenced to 13 months in prison by a British court for stealing a print of street artist Banksy's iconic Girl with Balloon from a London gallery in September last year. Larry Fraser, 49, was jailed on Friday by a judge in southwest London after he pleaded guilty to the smash-and-grab burglary of the elusive artist's painting, valued at 270,000 pounds ($355,200). Despite trying to conceal his identity with a mask, Fraser was caught on camera, and police tracked him down two days after the theft."
"One version of the painting shredded itself into pieces the moment after it was sold for more than one million British pounds ($1.3m) by London auction house Sotheby's in 2018. Detective Chief Inspector Scott Mather said: Banksy's Girl with Balloon' is known across the world and we reacted immediately to not just bring Fraser to justice but also reunite the artwork with the gallery."
"In 2005, he sprayed nine stencilled images at different locations along the illegal, eight-metre-high (26-foot) separation wall that Israel has constructed in the occupied West Bank. They included a ladder reaching over the wall, a young girl being carried over it by balloons and a window on the grey concrete showing beautiful mountains in the background."
Larry Fraser, 49, was sentenced to 13 months after pleading guilty to a smash-and-grab burglary that stole a print of Banksy's Girl with Balloon from a London gallery in September. The print was valued at 270,000 pounds and was recovered shortly after police tracked Fraser down from surveillance footage despite his mask. Judge Anne Brown described the incident as a brazen and serious non-domestic burglary. Banksy's Girl with Balloon has appeared across London and in the occupied West Bank, including a version that shredded itself after a 2018 Sotheby's sale and stencils on the separation wall.
Read at www.aljazeera.com
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