Elias Sakhai Goes To Jail

He Sold Everything From Art To Oil
Wells

The Art World Is Shocked

He Sold $115 Million In His Oil Well
Venture

A Zionist Con Man

A New Yorker who bilked millions from the art market, got caught, and
not skipping a beat sold oil wells.

Ely Sakhai Arrives

Ely Sakhai emigrated from Iran to USA 1965.

Creating An Image

Among other things, he sponsored the Ely Sakhai Torah
Center.

Ely Becomes A Minor Celebrity

He become a minor art dealer who owned The Art Collection, Inc.
and Exclusive Art art galleries in lower Manhattan, New York City.

The Scam Begins

In the 1980s Sakhai begun purchasing $30,000 Impressionist and
Post-Impressionist works. He constantly bought worthless old
paintings just for the canvas. He had Chinese immigrants working
in his gallery copy the works, and sold the forgeries with the
genuine certificate of authenticity. Months or years later he
would obtain a certificate of authenticity for the original and
then sell it. He usually sold the forgeries to Asian collectors
and real ones to New York and London galleries. Japanese
collectors trusted the certificate and would not commission a
European expert to authenticate a mediocre painting.

Asian Dealers Sniffed A  Fraud

Asian art experts eventually became suspicious as European and
Asian galleries had the same paintings. Everyone looked at Sakhai,
but he consigned the paintings through a network of fellow
Zionists, and everyone denied having anything to do with
forgeries.

Christie's and Sotheby's Auction Same
piece

Both paintings wre examined by art expert Sylvie
Crussard at the Wildenstein Institute in Paris. She confirmed that
the Christie's painting was a forgery; Christie's had to withdraw
their catalogue from the printers. They also informed the owners,
Gallery Muse in Tokyo. The original painting was auctioned at
Sotheby's and Ely Sakhai netted $310,000. However, FBI traced the
source of the forgery to Sakhai as
well.

Arrested In April Of 2000

Charged on March 4, 2004, with eight
counts of fraud. He was again released on bail.

Sells $115 Million In Oil Shares

Ely Sakhai and his associates winning permit Vic/P60 - to the
south-east of the existing multibillion-dollar Esso/BHP production
hub.

The permit was one of three licences in the Gippsland
Basin/Bass Strait that attracted work commitments of $115 million - a fact celebrated by the
Federal Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane and Victorian Minister
for Resources Theo Theophanous.

Sakhai Goes To A Country Club Prison

In July of 2005 he was sentenced to 41 months in prison, fined
$12.5 million, and ordered to forfeit art works, for the crime of
federal mail fraud.

Dying In Iraq For This Trash

His hatchling will wind up in Cornell, take out a government student
loan, and watch it disappear thanks to a friendly Sayanim. But your kid
has to go to Iraq to get tuition money, and that maybe pays for a State
School.

Another Con
Man

Judicial Index