Shock over charges of thefts from Johns

SALISBURY — The news that James Meyer was arrested at his home here last week and charged with selling stolen work by the artist Jasper Johns was received with shock and an unwillingness to believe that the results of the FBI investigation into Meyer’s deeds were correct.For the most part, people who know Meyer and his wife, Amy Jenkins, expressed concern for the family and said they felt sure that there must be more to the story and that Meyer couldn’t possibly be guilty.Meyer has lived in Salisbury since the mid 1990s, according to his website, www.jamesmeyerart.com. Neither he nor his wife responded to email offers for him to share his side of the story in an interview. Johns also declined to comment for this article.Meyer, who was born in 1962, had been the studio assistant to Johns since 1985, shortly after he graduated from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. He was one of several assistants who worked with Johns at his property in Sharon, where the FBI investigation said there is an office, archive and art studio.According to the town’s property database, Johns has owned the property since 1994. He is considered a recluse in town, and is rarely seen outside the walls of his 102-acre estate. The 83-year-old artist is often the subject of gossip and speculation; it is said that the staff at the estate and in the art studio are sworn to secrecy about anything that happens on the property. Meyer and his wife are a more visible presence in the area. Jenkins is a teacher at the Indian Mountain School, and was a member of the Salisbury Central School PTO while the couple’s two children were there. She and Meyer helped found and fund the artgarage at Housatonic Valley Regional High School while their children were students there. The artgarage is an after-school art program in the former Clark Wood Agricultural Education building. Professional artists come to the studio on weekdays during the school year to do their own work and to mentor students.Meyer and Jenkins moved to Lakeville in 1996. Meyer continued to do his own artwork, which has been featured in local shows including one last year at The Hotchkiss School’s Tremaine Gallery.The indictment against Meyer (which can be found online at the U.S. attorney’s office website, at www.justice.gov/usao/nys/pressreleases/August13/JamesMeyerSentencingPR.php) accuses him of taking almost two dozen pieces from Johns’ studio and selling them with the help of a gallery in Manhattan. The sales allegedly totaled $6.5 million; Meyer is said to have been paid $3.4 million from the sale.The gallery involved in the sales has not been named in the indictment and its identity seems to be a closely held secret.Meyer was arrested in Salisbury on Aug. 14 and appeared in federal court that afternoon. He was then released on $250,000 bond.The specific charges against Meyer are one count of interstate transportation of stolen property (which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison) and one count of wire fraud (which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years). The investigation was handled by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Complex Frauds.The indictment explains the first charge by saying that from at least September 2006 until at least February 2012, Meyer “did transport, transmit and transfer in interstate commerce, goods, wares and merchandise of the value of $5,000 or more, knowing the same to have been stolen, converted and taken by fraud, to wit, Meyer transported and caused to be transported unfinished works of art created by Johns from Connecticut to New York, knowing that they had been stolen.”The second charge is similar and says “Meyer engaged in a scheme to defraud potential purchasers into buying the unauthorized works by, among other things, falsely representing the status and provenance of the artwork.” To do so, he is accused of causing “among other things, interstate emails to be sent from New York, N.Y., to owners of certain art galleries and potential purchasers located elsewhere in the United States and abroad.”The indictment warns that if he is convicted, Meyer will have to “forfeit to the United States … all property, real and personal, that constitutes or is derived from proceeds traceable to the commission of the charged offenses, including but not limited to a sum of money representing the amount of proceeds obtained as a result of the offenses charged” in the indictment.If any property has been transferred to a third party, according to the indictment, or if it “has been substantially diminished in value or has been commingled with other property which cannot be subdivided without difficulty,” then the government will “seek forfeiture of any other property of the defendant up to the value of the above forfeitable property.”There is no information available yet on a court date for the case.