Section: NEWS
Of The Post-Dispatch
Convicted violin swindler Keith Bearden says the feds closed in on him and a swarm of Japanese police snatched him off the streets of Tokyo last year as he was trying to earn enough money to repay millions of dollars he had stolen.
In a wide-ranging interview Thursday, he talked of his hopes of returning to Japan one day to buy back the instruments he had stolen and resold there.
From jail, he sent this message to his victims:
"I can't say I'm sorry enough."
He promised to pay back all of them - no matter how long it takes.
According to the judge, it will take at least 20 years.
Bearden's promise came just after U.S. District Court Judge Carol E. Jackson ordered him to repay more than three-quarters of a million dollars.
In September, Bearden pleaded guilty to stealing three times that amount.
The judge said she was sorry for the other victims who would get no restitution. "They will have to seek other means of reimbursement," she said.
Under Jackson's ruling, Bearden must repay 13 victims in full; 21 more who signed complaints will get nothing or only part of what was stolen.
Bearden was ordered to pay in monthly installments of $3,100. The judge says he should have the entire $763,300 debt paid off in 20 years.
Jackson cited a new law requiring restitution for crimes committed as of April 24, 1996. Restitution isn't mandatory for crimes before that date, and Jackson said Bearden would have trouble just making enough money to live on after he finishes a two-year prison term.
With time off for good behavior, Bearden expects to be in a half-way house by Christmas.
Bearden will celebrate his 43rd birthday today in the Franklin County Jail in Union, Mo. He's waiting to find out which federal prison he will be transferred to, now that his criminal court appearances are finished.
He spoke for about an hour with the Post-Dispatch, which disclosed his growing list of victims last March, a month before a U.S. grand jury issued a suppressed indictment.
Bearden came across as friendly, polite - and naive.
"He is a charming guy," said the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Attorney Don Wilkerson. "But I wouldn't want to trust him."
After prison, Bearden plans to return to bow making to pay his debts. He's unsure if he will return to St. Louis.
A world-class bow maker
Bearden described how he began repairing violins at age 12. At 17, he was working full time in his father's violin shop after graduating from O'Fallon High School in 1971 or '72. ("I'm not very good with dates.")
In 1986, he went off to Hollywood to sharpen his skills at one of the big- name rare instruments shops. He returned in 1989 as a world-class violin bow maker to open a shop next to Powell Hall, home of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra.
He may have been talented, but he was poor - and didn't like it.
He became close friends with many of the musicians and soon one of his new friends asked if he had a buyer for a Stradivarius.
Within three days, Bearden had sold the violin for $700,000.
His commission was $50,000; it was more than he had earned in a year of bow making.
Bearden had the bug; he was ready to go big time. By 1991, he opened a new shop in Shrewsbury, then took on a partner and a couple of employees.
His customer list grew. From around the world, he got requests to buy and sell instruments. Most of this work was done on a promise or a handshake. Artists trusted one another and Bearden, who came from a long line of bow makers, was one of them.
One week, he says, he had $5 million to $6 million worth of instruments stashed in his office safe.
That's when things began to go wrong. It was all perfectly innocent, he says: He got behind in his bills and couldn't catch up.
He couldn't bring himself to lay off his employees and he couldn't say "no" to his customers. They were all his friends.
By 1994 and 1995, he was in real trouble. He hesitated to answer the phone, so many of his friends were calling to demand their money.
Robbing Peter to pay Paul
It's a cliche, but in his case true, he says: "I began robbing Peter to pay Paul." Not that he considered it robbing. "I always intended to pay everyone back."
He says he doesn't know how much he took in all, or from how many people. "I'm not a business person," he said. "I have no business balancing books. I'm just an artist."
In October 1996, he left for Japan, hoping to earn enough to restructure.
Within weeks, he began hearing reports that the FBI was asking ques tions about him. That spooked his customers; more of them began calling demanding money. Sometimes he paid, sometimes not.
Bearden decided to stay in Japan. He began teaching bow making. He also opened a small shop, where he continued to buy and sell instruments. Always, he says, he intended to earn enough to repay everyone.
One customer was Marilyn Beabout, whom he had known as a musician with the St. Louis Symphony.
Beabout gave him $80,000 to buy a violin that he promised to resell at a good profit.
In Tokyo, Bearden says, he sold the instrument at a wholesale price. Beabout never got the money nor her instrument.
Louis Caporale, another American instruments dealer in Tokyo, was friends with Bearden and Beabout.
Caporale says that when he learned what had happened, he found out who had bought the violin. He and Beabout put up the money to buy it back. She put up $25,000, while Caporale put up the rest - he won't say how much. They got the violin back, and Caporale returned it to her.
Caporale says he recovered and returned at least one more instrument that Bearden had stolen.
Caporale says that Bearden "did do wrong and there's no excuse but it wasn't to line his pockets." He says he still considers himself Bearden's personal friend.
While Bearden was in Tokyo, a U.S. grand jury in St. Louis was investigating him. Last April, it issued an indictment, suppressed because he was out of the country and couldn't be arrested.
Arrested by Tokyo police
On June 13, still oblivious to the pending criminal charges, Bearden was walking to a neighborhood hardware store outside Tokyo.
Suddenly, he says, a swarm of plainclothes Japanese police officers surrounded and arrested him. He couldn't understand what they wanted. When an interpreter arrived, Bearden heard the word "indictment."
The Japanese threw him into a detention cell, where he stayed until August, when he was returned to St. Louis.
Bearden's mother and aunt have remained faithful supporters. So have some in the Symphony. He says David Halen, concertmaster, is one of several who have written letters of encouragement.
(Halen emphasizes that he doesn't condone the thefts. "I just felt extremely sorry for him.")
Bearden credits them and his attorney, Scott Rosenblum, with helping him through the ordeal.
"I did have good intentions," Bearden said. "They were just stupid."
