Dutch artist Han Van Meegeren was arrested in 1945, for aiding and abetting the Nazis in the plunder of art masterpieces from the Netherlands. What was his defense?

Humanist

Take your pick: Sternly, the judge asked Van Meegeren why he had "done this thing." Replied the 58-year-old painter: "Because no one noticed my work." " . . . My paintings will become original Vermeers once more. I produced them not for money but for art's sake." http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,887772,00.html May 19 09, 7:42 PM

raidersruleall

He claimed that since he had traded the forged "The Woman Taken in Adultery" for 200 original Dutch paintings taken by Hermann Goering, Van Meegeren said that he was actually a national hero. http://www.essentialvermeer.com/misc/van_meegeren.html May 19 09, 7:48 PM

Humanist

And, no doubt, he never would have confessed at all if he hadn't been trapped in a catch-22: he had thrived so noticably during the war that when it ended, he was quickly arrested as a Nazi collaborator. His only defense was to admit that he himself had painted the remarkable "Vermeers" that had passed through his hands—a confession the public refused to believe, until, in a huge media event, the courts staged the public painting of what would be van Meegeren's last "Vermeer." http://search.barnesandnoble.com/I-Was-Vermeer/Frank-Wynne/e/9781582345932 Note: As a former lawyer, I've tried to answer this question looking for a "legal defense" (and there well may be one in the record). Usually, I don't offer a second post with a different answer, but the excerpt above hints at a startling incongruity: his defense to the charge of being a Nazi collaborator (which I imagine was just about the most serious charge that could be levelled at someone post-WWII) was that he "did it", that is, he was a forger! Not guilty by reason of being guilty! May 19 09, 7:54 PM