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Thieves last week stole a prized 16th-century masterpeice painting from an Odesa museum. The painting, by Italian Baroque artist Michelangelo Merisi de Caravaggio, could be worth as much as $100 million, according to some estimates. UNIAN A prized 16th century painting worth an estimated $100 million was stolen under very lax security conditions leaving other state-run museums vulnerable

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In a theft which showcased the poor security at Ukrainian museums that house scores of masterpieces, a prized 16th­century painting by Italian Baroque artist Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio was stolen from Odesa’s Western and Eastern Art Museum last week.

Lax security was compounded by negligence. Authorities don’t even know precisely when the crime took place – only that it was between 6 p.m. on July 29 and early on July 31.

The missing painting is known by two names: The Taking of Christ and The Kiss of Judas. It is estimated to be worth millions of dollars, perhaps up to $100 million. An earlier work by Caravaggio, Apollo the Lute Player, fetched $110 million at Sotheby’s in 2001.

Police suspect a solo burglar bypassed the museum’s outdated alarm system by carefully removing glass panes from the window. The alarm would have only worked if the window was broken. He crudely cut out the painting from its frame and escaped from the museum through the roof of the nearest building.

Police conceded that security was poor, but theorized that the culprit was not a professional art thief.

“Such people are sick and have no idea what they were doing,” said Valeriy Kiyuk, an Odesa investigator handling the case.

Eyewitness accounts of a man who had scoped out the museum recently helped produce a sketch of a suspect. Museum workers said they have repeatedly asked city authorities to modernize the security system, but their requests were declined.

The story of the painting is itself wrapped in mystery.

Some art experts told the Kyiv Post that Caravaggio authored three copies of this painting. The National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin claims to hold the first. The one stolen from Odesa was brought from France to the Russian Empire by its ambassador in the 19th century, and was presented to a member of the royal family. It landed in Odesa Art College after the expropriation following the 1917 revolution. It was later transferred to the Western and Eastern Art Museum. An art expert said the third is located in Rome, Italy.

The paintings traveled around for centuries, were lost and rediscovered by enthusiastic art collectors and experts, some of which have written extensively on this particular painting.