Kenmore man sentenced for possessing stolen Hitler bookmark

A Kenmore man who tried to sell a stolen gold bookmark that purportedly belonged to Adolf Hitler was sentenced Friday to 30 days in federal detention and three months of house arrest.

But the federal judge also said he has strong suspicions that the internationally publicized caper was not an isolated incident for the wealthy Romanian immigrant, and that he may have been "wheeling and dealing for quite some time."

"I think there's a lot more to this than meets the eye," U.S. District Judge Ricardo Martinez told 37-year-old Christian Popescu.

Popescu pleaded guilty in March to sale or receipt of stolen goods for possessing the artifact, which was pilfered by unknown thieves from a Madrid auction house in 2002.

Popescu was arrested in November outside a Starbucks in Bellevue, after he met an undercover agent and agreed to sell the bookmark for $100,000.

The 18-carat bookmark is about 6 inches long and is topped with a swastika and an engraved likeness of Hitler.

Though some experts have questioned the story, the bookmark is generally thought to have been a gift to Hitler from Eva Braun, his longtime mistress who later became his wife, to console him on the German army's defeat at the Battle of Stalingrad in 1943. It is engraved in German, "My Adolf, don't worry ... (the defeat) ... was only an inconvenience that will not break your certainty of victory."

After Hitler and Braun died in Berlin in the closing days of World War II, the bookmark is believed to have passed to the family of Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, Hitler's armed-forces chief who was tried for war crimes at Nuremberg and hanged.

It eventually ended up at the auction house in Spain, where it was stolen along with other items just before its auction. Despite the hefty price Popescu was seeking, the insurance company only paid the auction house about $10,000 for its loss. U.S. authorities now will be working with the Spanish government to return it to its legal owner, prosecutors said.

It's still not entirely clear how Popescu came by the bookmark.

In conversations with the undercover agent, he seemed to have detailed knowledge of its theft. But he later told authorities that he bought it from someone in a nightclub for $3,500.

Popescu only faced up to six months in prison because of the low actual market value of the bookmark. Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Woods argued that Popescu should be locked up for three months, in part because his attempts to sell it on the black market would have meant "that the bookmark would remain concealed from the public and the rightful owner."

Popescu's lawyers asked for a five-day sentence — time Popescu has already served — in part because of the "public humiliation" he has suffered. In particular, he was lampooned by Jay Leno during a "Tonight Show" monologue in December.

But Judge Martinez questioned Popescu's portrayal of himself as a mere used-car salesman and upstart restaurateur, pointing out that Popescu pays hefty mortgages on two expensive homes but didn't file any income taxes for several years.

He also questioned Popescu's story about buying the bookmark in a nightclub, and wondered aloud whether Popescu wasn't also involved in selling other artifacts or artwork. Popescu's home was burglarized shortly after his arrest, and Martinez questioned whether that was an inside job to get rid of contraband.

"I've been doing this for a while, and there are some things that don't make sense," Martinez said. But he agreed there is no evidence to back up any of his suspicions.

Popescu didn't address those suspicions directly, but he explained that he received large amounts of money from his family in Romania. He also apologized to the judge and said it was a "stupid crime."

"What I did brought a great deal of embarrassment and shame to me," he said.