Bobby Donati

Robert Donati (June 4, 1940 – c. September 21, 1991) – who went by the name of Bobby and was also known by the nickname Bobby D – was an American career criminal.

Along with his twin brother Richard, he was associated with the New England-based Patriarca crime family.

Bobby and Richard Donati were born on June 4, 1940, in East Boston, to immigrants from Milan, Italy.

The neighborhood, predominantly Italian-American at the time, was home to many Italian-American Mafia members and street criminals.

His criminal history dates to 1958, when he was 17.

He and his brothers were long believed to be part of the Angiulo Brothers' crew, with whom they carried out burglaries.

Both Donatis, known colloquially as Bobby and Dicky D, joined their ranks early; Bobby's first arrest dates to 1958.

By 1965 the brothers were already involved in the Boston mob, working for the Angiulo Brothers' crew, part of the Providence-based Patriarca crime family, mainly pulling robberies and burglaries from a base in the city's North End.

That year he was convicted and sentenced to prison for his role in the armed robbery of cash and furs from a Boylston Street furrier.

Later, during the 1970s, Joseph Barboza recognized the brothers' prominence in the Boston mob by using their name as his alias after he moved to San Francisco, where he was killed in 1974.

In the early 1970s, Donati became friends with Myles Connor Jr., a former rock musician and son of a Milton police officer who had turned to art theft as a career.

Donati, who had begun to search through local antique stores in search of quality furniture and decor for his house, began planning jobs with Connor.

The two frequently visited the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, as they had done since the early 1970s, noting how weak the security was given the expensive artworks within it.

They identified specific works they believed could sell well if stolen; Donati was particularly interested in one of the lesser items in the museum's collection, a Napoleonic Era finial, while Connor had his eye on Titian's The Rape of Europa; he also tried to interest Donati in a bronze Shang Dynasty gu.

Connor and Donati went as far as to climb nearby trees and time the guards' movements through the various galleries during the night hours when the museum was closed.

They agreed the most effective way to enter was to pose as police officers, which they had done on some other jobs.

In 1974, the two broke into the Woolworth Estate in Monmouth, Maine, and stole five paintings by Andrew and N.C. Wyeth.

They were caught when an acquaintance Donati had made who said he would help them sell the stolen works turned out to be an undercover FBI agent.

While Connor was out on bail, he arranged for the theft of a Rembrandt from the Boston Museum of Fine Arts in which he later claimed Donati had taken part; in exchange for its return he received a reduced sentence.

Donati, by then serving a sentence in state prison and unsuccessful in his efforts to persuade a federal judge to reduce his sentence for securities theft, took note.

After both had finished their sentences, they continued planning art thefts.

In the 1980s, Donati's stature within the Patriarca family increased as a result of leadership changes.

In 1981, the Massachusetts State Police described him as "a well-known organized crime figure".

Family boss Raymond L.S. Patriarca died in 1984; that same year the Angiulos, Donati's longtime bosses, were arrested on federal racketeering charges which led to their convictions two years later.

Vincent "The Animal" Ferrara, one of several higher-level mobsters vying for control as Patriarca's son struggled to maintain his father's control over the family, took over the Angiulos' operations in Boston's North End.

He chose Donati to be his driver.

The Patriarca situation worsened as the decade drew to a close.

Without his father's close Boston allies the Angiulos, the younger Raymond Patriarca was unable to unify the family behind him.

In Boston itself, Whitey Bulger, leader of the Winter Hill Gang, began brutally asserting his own authority over criminal enterprise from his base in South Boston, playing off his putative allies on both sides of the Patriarcas by informing on them to the FBI until the Boston Globe revealed the relationship in 1988.

In 1989, Frank Salemme, a close confidant of the elder Patriarca's, was released from prison.

Ferrara and the other Boston members of the family feared he would attempt to effectively take over the leadership by becoming Raymond Jr.'s underboss.

They attempted to have him killed outside a Saugus restaurant, but he survived some serious gunshot wounds.

In recent years, however, Donati has been identified as possibly being involved in the 1990 theft of art worth $500 million from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the largest art theft ever.

Some accounts link his death to that crime instead.

It has been reported that Donati stole the art in an attempt to get his boss Vincent M. Ferrara released from jail in order to ensure Ferrara would not be killed by the rival faction, which was gaining control of the Patriarca family at that time.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which had Donati under heavy surveillance at the time of his death, has not publicly identified him as a suspect in the art theft, which it is still investigating.

On September 24, 1991 – three days after he had last been seen alive leaving his house in the Boston suburb of Revere – his bound, beaten, and stabbed body was found in the trunk of his Cadillac, a short distance away.

The killing remains unsolved.

Donati's death has long been attributed to the struggle between two factions for control of the Patriarca family at that time, after Raymond Patriarca, Jr. proved unable to unite the family following his father's death.

Donati was reportedly a government informant, although federal prosecutors have denied it.