The Stupendous Shirley S. | 7

Summary

Big Time Podcast Summary: "The Stupendous Shirley S." Episode 7

Release Date: May 5, 2025
Host: Steve Buscemi
Produced by: Campside Media and Piece of Work Entertainment

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Introduction

In episode 7 of Apple’s original podcast Big Time, hosted by Steve Buscemi, listeners are introduced to the fascinating and tumultuous life of Shirley S., a woman whose penchant for adventure led her into the shadowy corners of the art underworld. Titled "The Stupendous Shirley S.," this episode delves deep into Shirley’s elaborate schemes, her relationship with Albert Sack, and the consequences of her audacious criminal endeavors.

Background: Albert Sack and the Meeting with Shirley

The story begins with an introduction to Albert M. Sack, a 20th-century pioneer in American antiquing. Born in 1915, Albert transformed antiquing into a popular hobby through his guidebook, Fine Points of Furniture, and gained fame as a regular on Antiques Roadshow. His expertise and reputation attracted high-profile clients, including Barbara Streisand and Harrison Ford, and earned a section in the Metropolitan Museum of Art for his family's furniture collection.

Albert was an eligible bachelor until he met Shirley, an elegant and charismatic art dealer from Boston. Their first encounter was unconventional; on their first date at the airport, Shirley, adorned in a frilly dress, half-jokingly asked Albert, "Will you marry me?" (00:00, Steve Buscemi). Intrigued and captivated, Albert quickly fell for her, unaware of the complex future that awaited them.

Shirley’s Descent into the Art Underworld

Shirley, née Dorothy Zacks Silberg Silton, was not born into wealth. Her parents were Orthodox Jewish immigrants from Russia who lived modestly. However, Shirley developed an affinity for the finer things in life, leading her to a successful career as an art consultant in Boston. Despite several failed marriages, her drive and unique approach to business made her stand out.

Deborah Friedman, Shirley’s eldest daughter, provides insight into her mother’s character, recalling how Shirley managed artists and even orchestrated insurance scams to support her endeavors (04:26). Shirley’s criminal inclinations became more pronounced when she connected with Eddie DiPietro, a dangerous and violent crook (07:14, Anthony Amore). Acting as the brains behind art theft operations, Shirley became adept at fencing stolen artwork, leveraging her reputation in the art world to facilitate these illicit transactions.

The Harvard Art Heist

One of Shirley’s most audacious crimes was the theft of paintings from Harvard University’s president, Derek Bok’s private residence in Cambridge on July 7, 1976. Shirley’s crew forcefully accessed the mansion, stealing valuable impressionist and landscape paintings valued at over $350,000. This operation marked Shirley’s deep dive into high-stakes art theft.

Following the heist, Shirley attempted to fence the stolen art, which is when she met Albert Sack. Their relationship blossomed, leading to marriage despite Albert’s family’s disapproval. Deborah Friedman describes Albert as a "mensch" and "ubermensch," highlighting his unwavering support for Shirley, even as her criminal activities became more entangled (09:42).

Marriage and Continued Criminal Activities

Albert’s devotion to Shirley was evident as he stood by her through her arrest for the Harvard theft, earning Shirley the FBI nickname "the Finger" (10:31). Despite the tarnished optics of being associated with a convicted art thief, Albert’s commitment never wavered. He maintained their bond by visiting Shirley in prison regularly, bringing her comforts like Dunkin’ Donuts and beauty products (10:58).

Upon Shirley's release from prison after serving her sentence, Albert and she moved to a luxurious Manhattan apartment on East 56th Street, transforming it into a display of both Albert’s antiques and Shirley’s dubious art acquisitions. Their home became a symbol of their complex relationship—where legitimacy and illegality coexisted harmoniously.

Shirley’s Ruby Scheme and Downfall

In the late 1980s, Shirley shifted her focus to gems, aspiring to elevate her status and regain the spotlight. She ventured into Myanmar to broker deals with General Kunsa Khun Sa, a notorious warlord and opium trafficker. Shirley’s plan was to facilitate the sale of rubies to replace the drug trade, blending humanitarian motives with financial gain (15:09, Alyssa).

However, Shirley’s venture unraveled disastrously. The deal fell through as the rubies were not as valuable as anticipated, plunging her into significant debt. Forced to close her jewelry business, Shirley returned to art dealing, further entangling herself in deceit by selling fake masterpieces alongside Albert’s genuine antiques (19:59). Despite Albert’s high-end antique sales, Shirley’s mounting credit card debt led her into more fraudulent activities, culminating in a failed attempt to sell paintings to an undercover FBI agent in 2001.

The Final Bust and Legal Consequences

In May 2001, Shirley, along with conspirator Arnold Katzen, attempted to sell two paintings worth $4.1 million at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Boston. Unbeknownst to them, the buyer was an undercover FBI agent monitoring their activities. The sting operation led to their arrest, with Shirley facing severe legal repercussions. Deborah Friedman recounts the family's turmoil, highlighting Shirley’s reckless endangerment of her loved ones (22:16).

Ultimately, Shirley pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges, avoiding a trial by accepting three years of probation, a stark contrast to the potential 20-year sentence she faced (23:11). Katzen received a similar probationary sentence. The legal battle left Albert and Shirley financially devastated, forcing them to relocate to North Carolina to live with Deborah’s family.

Legacy and Conclusion

Albert’s unwavering support for Shirley, despite her continual descent into criminality, became a point of both admiration and frustration for the family. Their New York apartment, once a beacon of luxury and artistry, became a symbol of their intertwined lives of legitimacy and fraud. Albert passed away in 2011 at the age of 91, followed by Shirley in 2019 at age 96.

Posthumously, Albert’s antiques were donated to museums, preserving his legacy in the art world. Meanwhile, Shirley’s collection of fake paintings remains with Deborah, serving as a testament to her audacious spirit and complex legacy.

Notable Quotes:

• Steve Buscemi (00:00): “You get the rush of the bank robbery or the romance of a torrid affair without having to risk it all.”

• Deborah Friedman (03:00): “Everyone knows about my mother now.”

• Deborah Friedman (09:42): “I thought, this is a mensch. Above all, mensches. This is an ubermensch.”

• Alyssa (12:46): “Albert was the only grandfather I knew.”

• Deborah Friedman (14:07): “There were people that shunned him. There were people that would invite him to things and not invite her.”

• Steve Buscemi (16:57): “We rely on you, ma'am.”

• Abby Ellen (25:07): “Albert's love for Shirley was so fucking blind.”

Conclusion

Big Time’s episode on Shirley S. paints a vivid portrait of a woman driven by a desire for adventure and recognition, whose ambitions led her down a path of elaborate scams and artistry-based crimes. Through meticulous storytelling and firsthand accounts, the podcast captures the essence of Shirley’s complex character and the enduring impact of her actions on her family and the art world.

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Transcript

[Steve Buscemi]

One thing I've always loved about the movies is the way that they can take you on a journey, an escape from real life. You get the rush of the bank robbery or the romance of a torrid affair without having to risk it all. And it seems like for a lot of us, that's enough. But then you come across someone like the star of today's episode, the stupendous Shirley S. And you realize that she needed to be the character in the movie to feel alive and not just one of those movies. All of them, the love affairs, the robberies, the secret spy missions, surely lived them all. I have to say, for someone who got arrested a lot and had a husband dropped dead, I do kind of love this lady. So settle in and get ready to hear the tale of the finger, a woman who seemed to want to be a criminal purely for the adventure. I'm Steve Buscemi, and you're listening to Big Time, an Apple original podcast from Piece of Work Entertainment and Campside Media Minnesota with Olive Productions. Here to tell us more is reporter Abby Ellen.

[Abby Ellen]

Albert M. Sack was a pioneer of American antiquing. He was born in 1915, and he's helped turn collecting old stuff into a hobby thanks to his popular guidebook, the Fine Points of Furniture. He was even a regular on Antiques Roadshow.

[Steve Buscemi]

You have one of the best New York tables I've seen. It's very fine craftsmanship, a beautiful example.

[Abby Ellen]

Fine furniture was a family business for the Sacks, but for Albert, it was more than that. It was his life. This was a man who would happily travel hundreds of miles to hunt for a rare side table or stool. He had celebrity clients like Barbara Streisand. Harrison Ford knew him by name. There's even a section of the Metropolitan Museum of Art dedicated to his family furniture collection. At the height of his career, Albert was an eligible bachelor. But that would change when a colleague introduced him to a woman named Shirley. Dorothy Zacks Silberg Silton Machinist. Shirley was a successful art dealer in Boston. She was elegance incarnate. She looked like Grace Kelly. And she had the air of a movie star, too. As the story goes, on their first date, Shirley met Albert at the airport in a frilly dress. She looked at him and said, half jokingly, will you marry me? He was hooked. They became a couple right away. But then, one fall day when the relationship was still new, there was a knock at the door. It was the FBI. Shirley. Glamorous, charming, perfect. Shirley was under arrest.

[Deborah Friedman]

It was all the bold colored headlines with my mother and the Boston Herald and the Boston Globe. And I remember thinking to myself, everyone knows about my mother now.

[Abby Ellen]

That's Deborah Friedman, Shirley's oldest daughter. Shirley had two daughters, Deborah and Donna. Donna passed away a few years ago. Debra knew her mom always wanted to be noticed, but not in this way.

[Deborah Friedman]

I know that people were always asking her, what do you think? And people were very impressed with her, her style. She really knew how to put things together and understood how to dress up a house like you dress yourself up and accessorize.

[Abby Ellen]

Shirley wasn't born into this elegant lifestyle. Her parents were Orthodox Jewish immigrants from Russ who moved to the States in the early 1900s. They lived simply, but somehow Shirley got the taste for the finer things. She had an insatiable appetite for design and decorating, which led her to pursue a career as an art consultant in Boston. She'd had several failed marriages and needed to support herself. Deborah remembers her mother being hardworking, sure, but she also remembers her mom approaching things differently.

[Deborah Friedman]

For example, my mother had some beautiful Emilio Pucci dresses, the best of what he was producing at that time. She created a fire in that closet with all those poochie dresses, and she was supposed to get a return for that, like an insurance scam.

[Abby Ellen]

Deborah says Shirley managed artists, too, helping them commission and sell paintings. Like a man named Desi, who sometimes drank on the job, she'd employ young Deborah to supervise him.

[Deborah Friedman]

She had his canvas, his easel, his paints, everything set up for him to just come in and paint. And here I am. I don't know, I'm eight or nine, and I thought I'd have some fun with a drunk artist. So he says, you have a cigarette? You have a cigarette. I gave him candy cigarettes, and he was trying to light them up.

[Abby Ellen]

It was a particularly dramatic time to be involved in the art world, especially in Boston.

[Steve Buscemi]

Police said today that they have recovered four paintings worth up to $2 million that were stolen last month from the Worcester, Massachusetts art museum.

[Abby Ellen]

In 1972, the first art heist ever pulled off at gunpoint happened just outside the city. Shirley saw an opportunity. She watched how these thefts played out.

[Deborah Friedman]

The insurance company would rather negotiate with a thief than have to pay out the claim on the insurance. So my mother thought that it was a viable way of doing business. Other people were getting away with it. Why not her?

[Anthony Amore]

She had a pretty active career in legitimate work and illegitimate work. And because of that, she had a lot of connection.

[Abby Ellen]

That's Anthony Amore. He's an art theft and security expert and New York Times best selling author. On those subjects, when he started doing research for his books, Shirley's name would come up a lot. Shirley's entrance into the art underworld started innocently enough. Deborah remembers her mother was working at an antique store in the swanky Beacon Hill neighborhood of Boston. There was a burger joint around the corner.

[Deborah Friedman]

My mother loves to eat and loves a grilled burger. And the smell from the grill a block away would waft in. She used to say they made the greatest burgers there.

[Abby Ellen]

Deborah says Shirley was such a regular, she made a new friend there, Eddie.

[Anthony Amore]

Eddie DiPietro. He's a dangerous guy, a violent guy.

[Abby Ellen]

Anthony Amore again.

[Anthony Amore]

From what I understand, he appears to have been a crook, involved in all sorts of career criminal type activities. He's the guy that would go into the house and steal the painting. He's more of the muscle than the brains.

[Abby Ellen]

Shirley was the brains. She became Eddie's fencer, the person who sells the stolen goods, in this case, fine art.

[Anthony Amore]

Have a little bit more of a leg up because she's known in the art world and she knows what she's talking about. So it gives you a bit more promise in terms of going and stealing art or maybe knowing what to steal.

[Abby Ellen]

Shirley grew close with Eddie and his crew of shady characters.

[Anthony Amore]

You think about Shirley, you think, boy, for somebody to be willing to be involved with these bad guys, and they were very bad guys. She had a lot of guts, like you could call her a lot of things, but you couldn't call her a coward or, you know, a wilting flower.

[Abby Ellen]

Deborah remembers these guys coming over to their place a lot around this time, bringing Chinese food or pizza for dinner. We don't know everything this crew got up to, and we probably never will. But we do know of one big job, a heist. They would steal art from Harvard University. Actually, from the president of Harvard, Derek Bok. Bok lived in a private residence in Cambridge, a sprawling mansion with 12 rooms and walls covered in art from Harvard University's own collection. On the night of July 7, 1976, some of Shirley's buddies found an inconspicuous rear window at Derek Bach's house and forced it open. They took a colorful French impressionist painting by Eugene Baudin and a moody landscape by Sanford Robinson Gifford, among a few other pieces. In, out done, they made off with over $350,000 worth of paintings, all while the Harvard president and his family were sound asleep. Afterwards, they broke the paintings out of their frames. It was like their version of cutting off the price tags on shoplifted clothes. Now it was Shirley's turn to try and fence the paintings and turn a profit. It's around this time when Shirley is introduced to Albert Sack. Right away, Albert won over Shirley and her daughter Deborah.

[Deborah Friedman]

I thought, this is a mensch. Above all mensches. This is an ubermensch.

[Abby Ellen]

What were they like together early on?

[Deborah Friedman]

Albert was like a schoolboy. I mean, he would look at her with these eyes. He never saw her ugly qualities at the beginning.

[Abby Ellen]

Then there was that knock at the door. The FBI had caught on to Shirley and Eddie's plans to sell those stolen paintings from the president of Harvard. Shirley was found guilty of conspiracy to transport stolen property. In addition to a short stint in prison, she'd earned a nickname for her role in the Harvard theft. Deborah says the FBI called her the Finger. What would become of Albert and Shirley's budding relationship? This well respected antiques dealer was now associated with the Finger. The optics were not great. This is when things could have gone very differently for Shirley. She could have had a terrible time in prison. She could have been sad, heartbroken, scared. But Albert Sachs stayed by her side. He read her love letters and visited her in prison every weekend.

[Deborah Friedman]

Albert would religiously visit my mother and bring Dunkin Donuts and pizza and nail polishes and beauty products.

[Abby Ellen]

And Albert remained devoted.

[Deborah Friedman]

They even married, despite the disapproval from his family. They would say, why can't you find a woman who can make chicken soup? Why did you pick such a complicated, crazy woman? And Albert was defiant. He loved her and he thought she was the most exciting, gorgeous, entertaining, charming, brilliant person.

[Abby Ellen]

No one wants to plan a honeymoon around a prison sentence. But Albert accepted Shirley's eccentricities.

[Deborah Friedman]

He said he thought the price of marrying a beautiful woman was to marry a crazy one.

[Abby Ellen]

For Shirley, her time in prison seemed like a generally positive experience. Her records detail a pretty active and rich time. Prison staff list her as polite, friendly, cooperative. She takes classes and maintains her social life. Family and friends visit it often.

[Deborah Friedman]

My mother was having her hair done there, her nails. She sat in the sun so she had a nice tan there. She looked like she was in a resort.

[Abby Ellen]

After a year in prison, Shirley was released into Albert's arms. He drove her to their new apartment in Manhattan. It was in a building on East 56th street called the Bristol. Deborah and Albert had painstakingly fixed it up for her. It's around this time that Shirley becomes a grandmother and Deborah becomes an aunt. Alyssa was Shirley's first grandchild.

[Alyssa]

She used to push me around Central park every day when the weather was nice. She'd take me in the stroller and, you know, roll me around Central Park. Her and Albert taught me how to walk and crawl and talk.

[Abby Ellen]

So Albert was your grandpa. I mean, you thought of him as your grandfather.

[Alyssa]

He was the only grandfather I knew.

[Abby Ellen]

To Alyssa, Albert and Shirley's home was the epitome of posh, bougie, glamorous.

[Alyssa]

It had these big, huge bay windows in the living room that just overlooked the whole, entire skyline of Manhattan. The bedroom is what I remember the most. Mirrors everywhere. The bed. That bed. That duvet cover was all monogrammed. Everything was SDS and baby blue. The pillow cases, the duvet, the towels, everything.

[Abby Ellen]

Sds. What was Shirley D. Sachs? Is that.

[Alyssa]

It was Shirley. Dorothy.

[Abby Ellen]

Dorothy Sachs. So it was all Shirley. It was. There was no Albert in the monograms. It didn't say like Shirley.

[Alyssa]

Oh, no, no, no, no.

[Deborah Friedman]

Yep.

[Alyssa]

There you go.

[Abby Ellen]

That's hilarious.

[Alyssa]

Gotta.

[Abby Ellen]

Even with the new last name, Shirley couldn't quite shake her past. Word got around about Albert's new wife and what she'd done at Harvard. Deborah again.

[Deborah Friedman]

There were people that shunned him. There were people that would invite him to things and not invite her. He would not allow that. I think she felt like being Albert Sachs wife. She would achieve the level of respectability that she always wanted, that she would reach a certain upper echelon that she had always desired.

[Abby Ellen]

But as much as she cared about.

[Deborah Friedman]

Albert, it bothered her that it wasn't her, that she wasn't the one that was getting the acclaim. She wasn't the one that was getting all the attention.

[Abby Ellen]

Shirley needed to find a way to strike out on her own, to get the spotlight back on her. So she became a gemologist. Rubies, sapphires, diamonds. If it shimmered, Shirley knew all about it.

[Deborah Friedman]

She designed this gorgeous, gorgeous necklace. So she really did have exquisite taste. It was sapphire and diamond. It was beautiful.

[Abby Ellen]

By the late 80s, her interest in gems brought her back to the Boston art underworld. Through her unsavory contacts, she. She eventually hooks up with someone who has access to really valuable rubies. A man named General Kunsa Khun Sa was a military leader in Myanmar, which was known as Burma. Deborah says Shirley's interest in Myanmar was largely humanitarian. Shirley knew that General Quinta and his people were involved in the opium trade. She also knew there were rubies in Myanmar. She was going to help them sell gems instead of drugs. Of course, there was something in it for Shirley. She'd bring home the rubies, make millions of dollars on them, and step out of her Husband's shadow ruby was like.

[Deborah Friedman]

The cashmere sapphire to her. There was a romantic allure.

[Abby Ellen]

So Shirley flew down to Myanmar to visit Khun Sa and help orchestrate a deal. Albert stayed home, but he was thrilled for his wife. This trip would be a fabulous new adventure for her. Shirley records the whole trip on a camcorder. Later, she'd make DVD copies for her family.

[Deborah Friedman]

The entire village, like 1200 people, line up on this dirt road.

[Abby Ellen]

People are very.

[Deborah Friedman]

And they hold up signs.

[Abby Ellen]

God also provided me a mountain with.

[Deborah Friedman]

This Shirley D Sac. Welcome to the Shan. The Shan people love you. Welcome. It was insane. I think that my mother was even.

[Abby Ellen]

Shocked with what we have in our potential.

[Steve Buscemi]

We rely on you, ma'am.

[Abby Ellen]

And you, gentlemen. Okay. The general is going to kiss you, ma'am.

[Deborah Friedman]

Obviously, she's sitting there in her little Chanel suit and gloves, like butter couldn't melt in her mouth. And she is so elegant, and she's just in her glory. She was treated with such respect. She was at the zenith of her existence. And everything that happened after that had to be so anticlimactic and so hurtful.

[Abby Ellen]

Now, as you might have already guessed, Shirley Sack, alas, could not influence one nation's whole economy. And general counsel, on top of being a drug trafficker, was a warlord. One diplomat had referred to him as the worst enemy the world has described.

[Deborah Friedman]

As the biggest heroin trafficker at large.

[Abby Ellen]

Today.

[Deborah Friedman]

He is known simply as Khun Sa.

[Abby Ellen]

He claims he's fighting a war to liberate the Shan people. America calls him a criminal. Beyond that, Debra says the ruby deal Shirley was hoping for fell through. The gems weren't as valuable as everyone had hoped.

[Deborah Friedman]

It was cut and it exposed all these flaws, and she ended up losing all this money on it.

[Abby Ellen]

She returns home from Myanmar defeated. This was a woman who survived and thrived in prison. But after this major loss, something changed. This was the first time Shirley couldn't charm her way into a better situation. After this failed ruby scheme, she's drowning in debt. She has to close her once lucrative jewelry business. So Shirley, now almost 70, goes back to art dealing. Albert continues to help his wife, connecting her with wealthy clients, his own contacts and associates. She rebrands herself. Shirley Sack, who never made it past 12th grade, would recount tales of going to Radcliffe and studying art history, which wasn't true. But the problem, Deborah says, was that Shirley was in a lot of credit card debt. She would go on shopping sprees to alleviate stress, and it got out of hand. Not even Albert's high end Antique sales could pay off her bills. Shirley's granddaughter Alyssa, now a preteen, would catch whispers of the adults talking.

[Alyssa]

I always heard, you know, scammer, things like that, like don't get yourself set up in that. You're gonna get yourself somewhere where you don't wanna be. Don't get involved with people like that. If Shirley was always involved in some sort of scam or scheme or something.

[Abby Ellen]

Shirley leaned on something she'd been doing her whole life, scheming and scamming in the art Underworld. In 2001, Shirley teamed up with a man named Arnold Katzen. They hatched a plan to sell two paintings to a drug dealer they just met. What's this guy's name? Katz. Katzen, Katzen.

[Deborah Friedman]

K A T Z E N. Do you know how much he was asking for those two paintings? 5 million.

[Abby Ellen]

This is Shirley on a phone call with a conspirator, trying to set the terms of the deal.

[Deborah Friedman]

$5 million.

[Abby Ellen]

That was the deal.

[Deborah Friedman]

That's not the deal.

[Abby Ellen]

You can hear her pushing for what she, she wants, but she's nervous. Something to know about art sales, or at least high end art sales, is that they're monitored very, very closely. Because buying art is such an easy way to launder money, the government keeps close tabs on these deals, especially if they're in cash. The sale of these paintings was supposed to take place at the Ritz Cartland Hotel in Boston. This is Special Agent Stephen Dew of the United States Customs Service. Today's date is May 30, 2001, and.

[Steve Buscemi]

The time is approximately 14:48.

[Abby Ellen]

There was a catch. This drug dealer she was planning to sell to was actually something worse for Shirley. He was an undercover agent. The FBI was after Shirley again. Recorder. In anticipation of a meeting with Arnold Katzen and Shirley Sack. I'm picking them up at the Ritz Carlton. Shirley's sitting on the couch in a Ritz Carlton hotel room, her hair piled high in a ponytail. Arnold Katzen and the undercover agent are there too. It's tense, you know what I mean? People, this is a very trust business.

[Anthony Amore]

Painting business is also trust.

[Abby Ellen]

All trust. It's trust.

[Anthony Amore]

It's as much trust from your side as my side.

[Abby Ellen]

It goes.

[Deborah Friedman]

It's just paintings are here, right?

[Abby Ellen]

It's clean, it's nothing.

[Anthony Amore]

I have an invoice for you.

[Deborah Friedman]

And basically he's saying to her, is it a problem? Can you move this money? I mean, they show up with a cash machine and you all make money.

[Abby Ellen]

Yeah, it sounds like an ideal way.

[Steve Buscemi]

To launder our money, that's for sure.

[Abby Ellen]

I don't know any other way.

[Deborah Friedman]

I'm thinking, how the hell could he do it?

[Abby Ellen]

Right after the video ends, the FBI swoops in and Shirley and Arnold are arrested. They're charged with attempting to sell two paintings for $4.1 million to an undercover agent. Deborah gets a call later that day about what had gone down in Boston.

[Deborah Friedman]

I remember feeling very angry. I remember feeling that she risked my husband, my family's safety. She would have risked us all.

[Abby Ellen]

After the dust settles and reality hits, the anger dissipates.

[Deborah Friedman]

I was angry, but I was very sad for her too, you know, because I had heart for her. There's my mother.

[Abby Ellen]

The evidence is all there against Shirley. The FBI recorded her talking about money laundering and skirting around laws. Combine that with her previous conviction and friendliness with general counso and Shirley doesn't exactly come across as a Girl Scout.

[Deborah Friedman]

She was so close to spending years in prison and that would have been the end of it for her.

[Abby Ellen]

If convicted, 73 year old Shirley Sack could have faced up to 20 years in prison. But the case never makes it to trial. She pleads guilty for her participation in the scheme and she has good lawyers. They argue that she was a victim of entrapment by an FBI informant and she agrees to a sentence of three years probation. Katzen pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge for conspiracy to fail to pay estimated taxes on the attempted sale of the paintings. He got three years probation, the same sentence as Shirley. From initial arrest to final plea agreement, Shirley's legal battles took over three years. The whole ordeal was incredibly costly for the couple.

[Deborah Friedman]

He was so upset that my mother was complaining that they had no money and she had been arrested in 2001 and he had to get rid of their life insurance policy and he had to spend a fortune of money on lawyers to get her out of this. And she was complaining that she didn't have life insurance, that she didn't have money. And he was like, I did it for her. She got herself in trouble. What was I going to do after all this?

[Abby Ellen]

Albert and Shirley are broke. So they pack up and move to North Carolina to live with Deborah and her family. Watching Shirley self destruct with Albert in the passenger seat was incredibly frustrating for the whole family.

[Alyssa]

Albert's love for Shirley was so fucking blind. Excuse me.

[Abby Ellen]

Shirley's granddaughter Alyssa.

[Alyssa]

Again, she could do no wrong in his eyes when she got thrown in jail for what, 19 months. Albert was driving from Manhattan down to Framingham every Weekend to visit her ass in jail. I mean, that's true love. That's commitment right there.

[Abby Ellen]

He doesn't leave her. It's fascinating. Deborah was also in awe of Albert's devotion. Did you say to him, albert, what the fucking fuck?

[Deborah Friedman]

Yeah, I did. Okay.

[Abby Ellen]

Good. Staying with Shirley might have been the only time anyone ever questioned Albert's judgment. He had built his reputation on his integrity and eye for excellence. He could spot an original Tiffany lamp in a sea of stained glass fakes. He wrote the rule book for collecting American antiques because in his world, following the rules is how you were successful. Shirley Sack didn't follow the rules, but that was never something she tried to hide about herself. When Albert met Shirley, his sensibility went out the window. In his world of dusty old antiques, Shirley was a live wire. She was the most exciting find of all. Their fancy New York apartment was a peek into their baffling relationship. It was impeccably decorated and the walls were covered in famous paintings.

[Deborah Friedman]

Ameri, Cassatt, Picasso, did Toulouse Lautrec.

[Abby Ellen]

But none of those paintings were real.

[Deborah Friedman]

There are these fantastic copies. And all these people that are dealers and very wealthy people who come into the apartment, I always wondered, what the hell are they thinking? You know, my mother wouldn't say anything.

[Abby Ellen]

Shirley's fake masterpieces displayed next to Albert's priceless antiques. I bet the room looked pretty fabulous. Albert died in 2011 at the age of 91. Shirley in 2019 at 96. After their deaths, their belongings were packed up. Albert's furniture got sent off to archives and museums as pieces of history. As for Shirley's fake paintings, they're still with Deborah, proudly displayed on her wall.

[Steve Buscemi]

Next week on Big Time. An incredible investment opportunity. This has been Big Time. An Apple original podcast produced by Piece of Work Entertainment and Campside Media in association with Olive Productions. It's hosted by me, Steve Buscemi. This episode was reported and produced by Abby Ellen and senior producer Amy Padula. Our story editor is is Audrey Quinn. Lane Rose is our showrunner and managing producer. Our production team includes Rajiv Gola, Morgan Jaffe and associate producer Dania Abdelhamid. Fact checking by Mary Mathis and Lindsey Kilbride. Sound design and mixing by Shawnee Aviram. Our theme was written by Nicholas Principe and Peter Silberman of Spatial Relations. Production help from Craig Russo and Todd Adlas as @soundpure and Ida Hardin as well as Post Pro. Special thanks to Wendy Kaufman and Linda Goldman Katz. Campside Media's executive producers are Josh Dean, Vanessa Grigoriadis Adam Hoff and Matt Scher follow and listen on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening.