Neither Reissfelder nor DiMuzio could be prosecuted. Both were beyond the reach of the justice system by the time investigators had assembled enough evidence to name them publicly.
—
## Carmello Merlino and the Mastermind Question
The man investigators came to believe had organized the theft—or at least provided a commission or a framework for it—was Carmello “Chickie” Merlino, a Dorchester-based mob figure associated with the Patriarca organization.
Merlino’s name appeared repeatedly in informant tips and in the connections among people who were being investigated. The theory that took shape in the investigation was that Merlino had provided a “shopping list”—a set of targets within the museum, probably centered on the Rembrandts, that he or someone above him in the criminal hierarchy wanted. The two men who entered the museum—Reissfelder and DiMuzio, in the FBI’s assessment—were street-level criminals capable of carrying out the physical robbery but not its planning.
The evidence for Merlino’s role is circumstantial in the public record. He was never charged with the Gardner theft. He died in prison in 2005—incarcerated for a separate crime—without providing investigators with useful information about the stolen art.
The Merlino theory is Geoffrey Kelly’s clearest articulation of what the investigation concluded. Kelly, who has been more forthcoming about investigative conclusions since his retirement and the publication of his 2026 book, argues that the theft was carried out by a loose network of Boston-area criminals, not by international masterminds or sophisticated art thieves. They were people who knew how to steal things. They were not people who understood the art world well enough to easily profit from what they took.