The Wizard of Oz : Man indicted for stealing Dorothy's ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz

A man has been indicted by a grand jury on charges of stealing a pair of ruby red slippers worn by Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz.

The shoes were stolen in 2005 and recovered by a 2018 FBI sting operation, but no arrests were made at the time.

A grand jury indicted Terry Martin with one count of theft of a major artwork, federal prosecutors in North Dakota announced on Wednesday.

The slippers were on loan to the Judy Garland Museum in the late actor’s hometown of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, when someone climbed through a window and broke the display case, prosecutors said when they were recovered. Over the years, several enticing rewards were offered in hopes that the slippers would turn up, including an anonymous donor from Arizona who put up $1m.

The road to the missing slippers began when a man told the shoes’ insurer in 2017 that he could help get them back. After a nearly year-long investigation, the FBI nabbed the shoes in Minneapolis in July 2018. At the time, the bureau said no one had been arrested or charged in the case.

On Wednesday, a summons was issued for Martin. An initial court appearance was set for 1 June, and it will be via video. Terry Van Horn, spokesman for the US Department of Justice in North Dakota, said he could not provide any information beyond what was included in the indictment.

The shoes are famously associated with one of the iconic lines in The Wizard of Oz, as Garland’s character, Dorothy, clicks her heels and repeats the phrase “There’s no place like home.”

They were made from about a dozen different materials, including wood pulp, silk thread, gelatin, plastic and glass. Most of the ruby color comes from sequins but the bows of the shoes contain red glass beads.

When they were stolen, the slippers were on loan from Hollywood memorabilia collector Michael Shaw. The three other pairs Garland wore in the movie were held by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Smithsonian and a private collector.

by CrystalRaindrops May 20, 2023 12:27 AM
Member since February 15, 2018

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