Attorneys for two brothers from Michigan facing federal charges over massive art and sports memorabilia fraud are discussing plea deals with federal prosecutors.
According to a joint status report filed this week in U.S. District Court, plea negotiations are ongoing between the government and Mark Henkel while a draft plea agreement has been sent to Donald Henkel for consideration. A third man charged in the case last year, Raymond Paparella of Florida, could be seeking a trial.
Acting U.S. Attorney Morris Pasqual told the court that the government produced supplemental discovery in May.
In April of last year, the Henkels, both in their 60s, were charged with what investigators say was a 15-year scheme to create and sell millions of dollars in fake artwork and vintage sports, music and other memorabilia to individual buyers and auction companies.
The news of continued plea negotiations comes more than three years after the FBI raided a rural property near Traverse City, MI that prosecutors called “a forgery factory.” An affidavit filed at the time indicated agents found the building “filled with art supplies, paintings ‘and other artwork that appears to be in progress as well as baseball bats, baseballs, and other memorabilia’.”
Court documents say Donald Henkel and bogus “straw sellers” recruited by Mark Henkel allegedly provided a false provenance for numerous items, including baseballs or bats purportedly signed by Lou Gehrig, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, and Cy Young, as a means to falsely portray the items as genuine to potential buyers.
Paparella is accused of being one of those straw sellers, scheming to conceal the Henkels’ involvement with the items in an effort to pass them off as genuine.
Donald Henkel was a local artist who is accused of creating the phony items. The indictment alleges that he falsely added signatures of artists such as Ralston Crawford and George Ault to paintings that he knew were not created by those artists, and then schemed with his brother, Mark Henkel, and others to fraudulently present the works as genuine.
Donald Henkel’s work was not unknown to some sports memorabilia auction houses and autograph authenticators.
“Christy Mathewson baseballs, Babe Ruth signed bats, game-used bats. This guy could do it all,” Beckett Authentication’s Steve Grad told us after news of the raid was reported. “He manufactured game bats. He got the lengths right, the specs, everything. I would call him a master forger.”
According to the indictment, Henkel also used pseudonyms while peddling the phony items including “Donovan Kelly” and “Bruce Kelly.”
Prosecutors say the alleged fraud scheme began in 2005 and continued until 2020. According to the indictment, many of the forged items were sold for more than $100,000 based on the false histories provided by the Henkels or the straw sellers they’d hired to dispense the fake items. The indictment cited the sale of fraudulent Christy Mathewson and Honus Wagner baseballs at the MLB Fan Fest Auction in 2005, both carrying made up stories of provenance. The two items sold for $133,000.
In 2015, the indictment states that the Henkels traveled with a relative to a memorabilia show, with the relative agreeing to provide a false history of the bat. It was rejected for consignment, however, after it failed autograph authentication. Prosecutors say Henkel then later removed the signature and and the bat was then sold for $52,680.
According to the indictment, auction houses and art galleries in multiple states and in London, England were among those duped by the forgeries.
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