Call it the $7 million question: Is Shawn R. Merriman’s collection of art, classic cars and sports memorabilia worth what he claims?
The answer may matter a great deal to 38 victims of Merriman’s alleged Ponzi scheme, who invested $17 million to $20 million with Merriman and might receive proceeds from an auction of the items.
Nearly 200 works of art, including 63 by Rembrandt and 18 by Albrect Durer, were among the assets seized from Merriman’s Arapahoe County home Wednesday. U.S. marshals also took a collection of what Merriman described as rare baseball memorabilia, including gloves autographed by Lou Gehrig and Josh Gibson.
Merriman estimated that all of his assets are worth $7 million, with the bulk accounted for by his art collection, court documents say.
Authorities have said they will hire experts to authenticate the items, but experts in art and memorabilia were skeptical about the value — or the legitimacy — of the collections.
Paul McCarron, a fine-prints dealer in Jersey City, N.J., said the list Merriman provided to investigators lacks information about the prints’ origins and quality that would give clues to the collection’s value.
“It’s very vague and amateurish,” McCarron said.
Rembrandts vary
Valuing prints is difficult because there are typically multiple copies of varying quality, and some were printed long after the artist’s death, said Robert Light, a fine-prints dealer in Santa Barbara, Calif. Prints were made from etchings crafted by the artist.
“An 18th century impression of a small Rembrandt might be a couple hundred dollars, while an early impression of a major Rembrandt etching could be six figures,” he said.
Rembrandt made about 330 etchings, and there’s “no way to say how many impressions (made from those etchings) are out there,” Light said.
Timothy Standring, the Denver Art Museum’s curator of painting and sculpture, praised a portion of Merriman’s Rembrandt print collection when it was displayed at several Mormon churches in the Denver area last year.
“These aren’t just any old Rembrandts,” he told The Denver Post.
“They are the best of the best. It is one of the most extraordinary private collections of old-master prints.”
Standring was not available for comment Friday.
Merriman bought a minority interest in respected New York art dealership C.G. Boerner several years ago. He told The Post last year that the move helped him acquire his collection.
C.G. Boerner issued a statement Friday saying Merriman, a “non-managing minority member” of the company, had withdrawn because of his legal and financial problems.
Sports holdings doubted
Experts in sports memorabilia were doubtful about the authenticity of Merriman’s claimed holdings, including gloves autographed by Yankees great Gehrig and Negro Leagues slugger Gibson, and a “Shoeless” Joe Jackson batting trophy.
“It would be more than a miracle on Passover and Good Friday to have these three items in any one collection. It would be like discovering another Rembrandt,” said Denver attorney and longtime memorabilia collector Marshall Fogel. “In all fairness you’d have to see it. But people would have known about them. You can’t keep things like this a secret.”
The odds are “extremely low” that either of the autographed gloves are authentic, said Kevin Keating, an Alexandria, Va., expert in autograph authentication.
Fans’ baseball gloves weren’t commonly signed in those days, and when they were, the autographs rarely survived continued use by their owners, Keating said. Signed baseballs are far more common.
“For it to have existed and not worn off and be in circulation somewhere without anyone knowing about it,” he said, “is improbable at best and almost impossible.”
Staff writer David Migoya contributed to this report.
Greg Griffin: 303-954-1241 or ggriffin@denverpost.com
