The man in the long coat \u2013 identified by authorities as Serbian national Nikola Krndija, 57 \u2013 slipped out of the restaurant with the wine, got to his getaway car and zoomed off from the L\u2019Auberge Proven\u00e7ale Inn & Restaurant west of Washington on November 19. He remains at large.<\/p>\n
His alleged partner \u2013 identified by authorities as Natali Ray, 56, of Kent, England \u2013 wasn\u2019t so fast, according to restaurant staffers, who caught and detained her as they called police. She remains in a Virginia jail.<\/p>\n
The two suspects were initially charged with three counts each: conspiracy to commit grand larceny, grand larceny and defrauding a restaurant, inn or similar business. More recently, the two were indicted on additional counts of conspiracy to possess burglary tools and possession of burglary tools, according to court records and Clarke County Commonwealth\u2019s lawyer Matthew Bass.<\/p>\n
In many theft cases, \u201cburglary tools\u201d are items used to break through a door or a window, such as a crowbar. In this one, the tools in question are the two wigs, Krndija\u2019s apparently fake facial hair and the overcoat, Bass said.<\/p>\n
\u201cVirginia code specifies that an outfit can be part of burglarious tools,\u201d Bass said.<\/p>\n
As the code describes it: \u201cIf any person have in his possession any tools, implements or outfit, with intent to commit burglary, robbery or larceny, upon conviction thereof he shall be guilty of a Class 5 felony.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ray is scheduled to appear in Clarke County District Court on Wednesday for a preliminary hearing on the original charges, according to court records. Clarke County sheriff Travis Sumption said Ray has not co-operated with his investigators.<\/p>\n
Ray is listed in court records as being represented by the Virginia Public Defender Office. Peter McDermott, the head public defender for the region that includes Clarke County, declined to comment this week.<\/p>\n
Investigators said that the day after the theft, Krndija boarded a flight from New York\u2019s John F. Kennedy International Airport bound for Vienna. \u201cWe do believe he made it home to Serbia,\u201d Bass said.<\/p>\n
The prosecutor isn\u2019t expecting an immediate capture. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to believe a tactical team would track him down in Serbia,\u201d he said with a touch of humour, \u201cbut we\u2019ll see.\u201d<\/p>\n
Also at issue are decoy bottles Krndija is accused of bringing into the restaurant inside his coat. Borel discovered two of them after the theft in the wine cellar and describes them as an effort to delay detection of the lifted bottles from France\u2019s fabled Domaine de la Roman\u00e9e-Conti estate, including one valued at $40,000.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs soon as I saw the screw caps, I was like, that\u2019s not it,\u201d Borel said.<\/p>\n
The bottles also had thin walls and fake labels, he said.<\/p>\n
Bass indicated his office may add the screw tops to the list of burglary tools.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe bottles, alongside the coat and disguises, will all be part of the commonwealth\u2019s case against them,\u201d Bass said.<\/p>\n
Sign up to Herald Premium Editor\u2019s Picks<\/a>, delivered straight to your inbox every Friday. Editor-in-Chief Murray Kirkness picks the week\u2019s best features, interviews and investigations. Sign up for Herald Premium here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The man in the long coat \u2013 identified by authorities as Serbian national Nikola Krndija, 57 \u2013 slipped…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272249,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[153854,95,11429,130976,102592,153853,13919,153851,153855,42,29260,55097,78,43,675,2539,3170,3057,165,66960,40,38,41,39,208,153852,6306,72405,1754],"class_list":["post-272248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-153854","tag-and","tag-arrive","tag-audacious","tag-cellar","tag-coat","tag-disguised","tag-disguises","tag-finagle","tag-headlines","tag-heist","tag-highend","tag-in","tag-news","tag-police","tag-restaurant","tag-scheme","tag-steps","tag-their","tag-thieves","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-tour","tag-trickedout","tag-use","tag-wigs","tag-wine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272248\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}