The Associated Press
Psychiatrist sentenced in house-sale scam
April 2, 1999
Early last year, Massachusetts antiques dealers were delighted with the opportunity a psychiatrist gave them to buy the contents of well-appointed homes on Martha’s Vineyard.
What they didn’t know was that he had broken into the homes they were visiting.
On Thursday, Lance Pope, 43, was sentenced to serve 18 months of a 2 -year sentence in the Dukes County House of Correction for breaking and entering and larceny.
Pope had managed to sell off a truckload of antiques before a sharp-eyed police detective caught him just after the act.
Early on an April evening last year, Oak Bluffs Police Detective Warren Gosson noticed lights burning inside a home normally open only seasonally.
He stopped. Inside the house were three island women who airily explained Pope had invited them to buy furniture and collectibles that hadn’t interested antiques dealers.
The house was almost empty. Gosson checked with the caretaker, who said the house was supposed to be closed.
Pope was arrested the next day.
Gosson eventually traced other thefts to Pope after spending untold hours investigating a series of break-ins and burglaries at summer homes between January and April last year.
Antiques dealers told him a polite, well-dressed and well-educated man had issued invitations to survey the contents of the houses.
Pope told some dealers he owned the home and wanted to get rid of items that no longer interested him. He told others, in conspiratorial asides, that he was helping a financially embarrassed friend or relative raise a little cash.
Dealers carried off marble-topped tables, antique chairs, dishes, bedding and collectibles.
One dealer fell in love with a chandelier, which he cut out of the ceiling and carted away, the Cape Cod Times reported.
Gosson said Pope, who grew up on the island, knew the houses’ contents because he had visited them as a friend or relative.
“As time went on, he became more and more knowledgeable of antiques themselves,” Gosson said Friday. “He brought the dealers stuff of more dollar value.”
Pope pleaded guilty in Edgartown District Court to three counts of breaking and entering, one count of larceny from a building, three counts of larceny pursuant to a single scheme and one count of larceny over $ 250.
He was also ordered to make $22,000 restitution to those victims whose belongings were not recovered.
Oak Bluffs police had managed to identify and bring back thousands of dollars worth of antiques from dealers on the island and the Cape.
“Eventually, we had to use a full-size Ryder truck to bring everything back,” Gosson said.
Pope’s attorney, Charles Morano, said his client was a drug addict and asked for probation to allow him to put his life back together.
Prosecutors said Pope should spend some time in jail because he had been calculating in committing the crimes.