Alleged violin thief extradited from France, headed back to L.A.

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The Long Beach man who is accused of stealing two rare violins from the Hollywood home of a L.A. Philharmonic musician was extradited from France Friday and will face a federal magistrate Monday in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles.

Anthony Eugene Notarstefano, 45, was arrested in France in 2007 after allegedly trying to sell the violins to a Parisian merchant. He was subsequently indicted for possession and foreign transportation of stolen goods. Notarstefano has formally contested his extradition from France.

The violins date from the 18th and 19th centuries and are worth an estimated total of more than $300,000, according to reports. They were stolen from the home of L.A. Philharmonic musician Mark Kashper, whose house was robbed Dec. 23, 2006. (Kashper currently serves as the associate principal of the orchestra’s second violin section.)

The L.A. Times reported at the time of Notarstefano’s 2007 arrest that one violin is an 18th century Tononi that belongs to the philharmonic and is valued at about $225,000, and the other is an 1855 Vuillaume that Kashper owned, worth about $65,000. A bow for the Tononi is valued at about $30,000.

Notarstefano was apprehended on the Rue de Rome near the Gare Saint-Lazare and close to the Paris Opera. He later denied knowing that the instruments were stolen and said that he had purchased them from someone for $15,000.

According the the French newspaper Le Parisien, Notarstefano made an unsuccessful attempt to commit suicide in February 2008 in a French prison. He later tried to escape from the hospital where he was under observation but was caught by authorities.

-- David Ng

Photo: Anthony Eugene Notarstefano. Credit: Le Parisien