Remember those wealthy gays who lost $27 million in major artworks to thieves? Now police are saying they're not even sure that the artworks even existed and maybe the whole thing is a hoax. Victims Benjamin Amadio and Ralph Kennaugh, Bostonite gays who allegedly amassed this amazing collection of art and hadn't had time to hang it in their rented home while they were looking to buy a place in the area, are not totally cooperating with police. Now they're claiming the cops "botched" the investigation, they leaked a ransom note to the media, and they refuse to take a polygraph exam saying that authorities should be able to solve the crime without "evidence attacking our character."

It did sound like a rather extraordinary collection of art -- what with 2 Rembrandts, a Pollock, 4 Miros, and a Van Gogh -- for an "entrepreneur" who doesn't appear in a Google search and a retired Harvard professor to have collected. ALSO, WTF were they doing with this collection, which they say is actually worth $80 million, in a rented home without any surveillance equipment or major security?  If you can afford this shit, you can afford a 24-hour armed guard. So yes, suspicious. [NBC Bay Area]

This is not one of the stolen paintings.Following on the theft a couple weeks ago in L.A. of 11 Andy Warhol paintings, we get news of an even more major art caper also being called "an inside job," this time in Pebble Beach. The home of well-to-do homosexuals A. Benjamin Amadio and Dr. Ralph Kennaugh (they are referred to in the NBC piece as "housemates" -- isn't that quaint) was robbed of an estimated $27 million in art including a Van Gogh, a Jackson Pollock, 2 Rembrandts, and 4 Miros. The men both hail from Massachusetts where Dr. Kennaugh was a professor at Harvard, now retired. Mr. Amadio is an entrpreneur. They are offering two separate rewards: $1M for the return of the artwork, and $5M for information that would lead to the capture of the thieves responsible. [NBC Bay Area]