Kempton Bunton - Return and Prosecution

Return and Prosecution

In 1965, four years after the theft, Bunton contacted a newspaper, and through a left luggage office at Birmingham New Street Station, returned the painting voluntarily. Six weeks later, he also surrendered to the police, who initially discounted him as a suspect, considering the unlikeliness of a 61 year old retiree, who weighed 17 stone, executing the heist.

During the trial the jury only convicted Bunton of the theft of the frame (which was not returned). Led by Jeremy Hutchinson QC (also notable for his involvement on the defence team at the Lady Chatterley trial), Bunton's defence had successfully claimed that Bunton never wanted to keep the painting, thus meaning he was not convicted of stealing the portrait itself. Bunton was sentenced to 3 months in prison. Section 11 of the Theft Act 1968, which makes it an offence to remove without authority any object displayed or kept for display to the public in a building to which the public have access, was enacted as a direct result of this case.

In 1996 documents released by the National Gallery implied that another individual may have carried out the actual theft, and then passed the painting to Bunton. Bunton's son John was mentioned in the documents.

In 2012 the National Archives released a confidential file from the Director of Public Prosecutions in which Bunton's son, John, confessed to the theft following his arrest in 1969 for a minor offence. John Bunton said that his father had intended to use the painting as part of his campaign and that it should ultimately be returned to the National Gallery. John said that both he and his brother, Kenneth, had been ordered by their father not to come forward despite his trial.