PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Benton County sheriff’s officers have recovered a centuries-old violin that vanished from a Corvallis, Ore., home. They’ve also made an arrest in the case.
Sgt. Don Rogers says the instrument valued at $50,000 was pawned several months ago for $100 at an Albany pawn shop. While the violin maker’s label — reading “Aloysius Marconcini, Bologna 1767” — is illegible, sheriff’s officers tracked it down last weekend through a bow that was pawned with it.
Officers arrested 35-year-old Marcianna Dawn Tinch of Corvallis for investigation of aggravated theft. Rogers says she showed her driver’s license to the pawn shop.
The sergeant says Tinch knows the violin’s owner Jennifer Joy.
The violin originally belonged to a Joy relative who was a concert violinist in Louisiana. Joy says she thought she’d stored it safely in her home. But when she looked for it in early November, it was gone.
