State police questioned and released the leader of a multi-state theft ring shortly after he burglarized Christy Mathewson memorabilia during a 1999 weekend celebration of the Hall of Fame baseball pitcher at Keystone College.
The burglary was the ring's first theft in a 20-year spree, but at the federal trial Tuesday of four ring members in Scranton, retired state police Trooper Craig Carey testified Thomas Trotta did not admit any involvement at the time.
The thief stole a 1906 Mathewson uniform jersey and two Mathewson player contracts.
"He never said he had anything to do with the incident," Carey said.
Trotta, who has pleaded guilty and admitted to leading the ring, is expected to serve as the star witness at the trial of four other ring suspects: Nicholas Dombek, Damien Boland and brothers Joseph and Alfred Atsus.
Carey said Trotta was among about 25 guests invited to an Aug. 13, 1999, roundtable discussion of Mathewson's career at Keystone. He also was one of three who asked to have a locked glass display case opened to get a better look at the jersey, Carey said.
Last year, Trotta told the television news magazine, "60 Minutes," he tried on the jersey. Neither Carey nor former Keystone athletic director Terry Wise confirmed that during testimony Tuesday.
The college regularly celebrates Mathewson because in the 1890s he attended Keystone Academy, the college's high-school predecessor.
"He's still a hometown hero, the local boy made good," Wise said.
Wise, who curated the school's Mathewson collection, said the pitcher’s wife Jane donated the jersey, the contracts and numerous other memorabilia in the 1960s. Normally, the school stored it all in a locked basement bank vault, but pulled them out for the weekend celebration yearly, she said.
Wise said she checked and made sure the glass display case was locked before she left after the roundtable and a one-act play about Mathewson ended.
She did not take the heavy wool jersey out because its weight made it hard to hang up again once removed from the case, she said.
The school gymnasium was undergoing renovations. Contractors were still working when she left and the gym was not secured, she said.
The next morning, she got a call about the burglary.
On cross-examination, Wise said the school still doesn't know what happened to the jersey or contracts.
Carey interviewed Trotta and the other men who asked to see the jersey. On cross-examination, he said Trotta did not seem nervous when questioned.
Opening statements
Wise and Carey were the first two witnesses called after prosecution and defense lawyers made their opening statements.
In his, Assistant U.S. Attorney James Buchanan portrayed Dombek, and the Atsuses as thieves who stole valuables meant for public enjoyment in burglaries they planned or carried out at museums and other sites in six states and Washington, D.C.
“Christy Mathewson, Yogi Berra, Ben Hogan, Czar Nicholas II, Roger Maris, Tiffany Jewelers,” Buchanan said. “They’re all icons of sport, icons of history and objects associated with other icons."
Memorabilia related to all were "stolen by a burly crew that include these four defendants,” he said.
Besides Keystone, the local targets included the Everhart Museum in Scranton, which suffered the loss of a painting by Andy Warhol and a purported Jackson Pollock painting; the Lackawanna Historical Society in Scranton, which lost an early 20th century Tiffany Lamp; and the Country Club of Scranton, where about a dozen trophies belonging to the late professional golfer Art Wall Jr., who grew up in Honesdale, were taken.
Art Wall's son testifies
Greg Wall, Wall's son and a Country Club of Scranton member, said his father "thought it was a great idea" when a club official offered to create an Art Wall Room there in 2001, the year he died.
The goods stolen there in March 2011 included Wall's trophy for winning the 1975 Milwaukee Open. Wall won the tournament when he was 51. He's still the second oldest golfer to win a Professional Golf Association tournament, his son testified.
Dombek is accused of melting down Wall's trophies into silver pucks that Boland and Trotta later sold in New York City for about $6,000, according to a federal indictment.
After the thefts, the club paid for replicas.
"At least we have replicas so we can see that dad won these events," Wall testified.
South Abington Twp. Police Chief Paul Wolfe, who investigated the theft as a patrolman, said he found the club's video camera wasn't working and an alarm system "was not used for some time."
The ring also took 16 World Series and other championship rings from Yogi Berra Museum, which honors the Hall of Fame baseball catcher, in New Jersey; the United States Golf Association Museum in New York, where Hall of Fame golfer Hogan’s valuable sportsman of the year belt was stolen; and a valuable Faberge Silver punchbowl, stand and ladle were stolen from the Harness Racing Museum and Hall of Fame in Goshen, New York. Long ago, the czar donated it to a harness racing enthusiast, Buchanan said.
“They were not hidden in a vault,” Buchanan told jurors. “They were not in a rich man’s home ... they were there for all ... until they were taken, until they were hidden, until some of them were melted down.”
Trotta traffic stop led to break in case
Buchanan also ran through many details of the two decades of thefts, but also how authorities cracked the case after years of mystery.
In 2018 or 2019, he said, police pulled over for drunken driving Thomas Trotta, who actually carried out most of the burglaries and began to cooperate, Buchanan said. They matched his DNA to blood found at crime scenes, he said.
“Ladies and gentlemen, Thomas Trotta is a thief and a burglar and, from 1999 to 2019, he did it with these defendants,” Buchanan said, pointing to the tables where the four sat with their lawyers.
“He (Trotta) has been their friend since childhood.”
Instead of letting the world continue to see the treasures, “they wanted them for themselves,” he said. “They wanted cash in their pockets.”
Buchanan acknowledged Trotta's background, but said Trotta would testify because he best knew the conspiracy.
Lawyers question Trotta's character
In their openings, defense lawyers repeatedly questioned Trotta's character.
“Thomas Trotta, Thomas Trotta, Thomas Trotta,” said attorney Gino Bartolai Jr., Dombek's lawyer. “It took the government (Buchanan) 20 minutes to mention Trotta in their opening statement.”
“He’s a thief, he’s a burglar, he’s a scoundrel,” Bartolai said.
"He’s also a liar," who left “a trail of lies and dishonesty,” he told jurors.
“We know who did it and the government will admit that,” Bartolai said. “Thomas Trotta is the one who did it.”
Attorney Matt Clemente, Boland's lawyer, said the evidence would show Trotta ranks as a "pathological liar," "a conman" and a "kleptomaniac" addicted to theft.
Trotta called himself a "professional liar" in a July 30, 2024, Sports Illustrated Magazine story, Clemente said.
"The man will say and do anything if he thinks it will help him," Clemente said.
After police stopped him for drunken driving in 2019, Trotta began to talk about his two-decade crime spree and named others in the ring as accomplices. Clemente pointed to DNA evidence tying Trotta to crime scenes
"Even when they had him dead to rights (with) DNA, he spent five hours" lying to them, the defense attorney said.
"He tells them I learned my lesson and promised to "get the stuff back," if they released him, Clemente said.
After police released him, "he didn't get the stuff back and he keeps committing crimes," he said.
While he's a cooperating witness, Clemente said, Trotta burglarizes a jewelry and antique store in New York state.
Investigators in Duchess County, New York, sent an email to a Pennsylvania prosecutor and Pennsylvania State Police warning against using Trotta as a cooperating witness and said they wouldn't any longer rely on him.
"That is a pretty big warning sign," Clemente told jurors. "His word is worthless."
In a hint perhaps of future defense strategy, Clemente said a prosecution expert called to value stolen loot is no real expert in antiques, arts, guns or sports memorabilia.
"He's an expert in none of those," he said.
Attorney Jason Mattioli, one of Alfred Atsus' lawyers, said no DNA, fingerprint or fiber evidence ties Atsus to the thefts.
No video or audio recording that prosecutors show will connect Atsus to the crimes either, he said. He also took Trotta to task.
"Mr. Trotta would steal his own mother's eyeballs and sell them if he could," Mattioli said.
He likened the prosecution case to "smoke and mirrors" similar to methods magician David Copperfield once used to make the Statue of Liberty disappear.
"They took Thomas Trotta at his word," he said. "Do not make the same mistake."
Attorney Patrick A. Casey, Joseph Atsus' lawyer, also faulted Pennsylvania State Police for keeping Trotta out on bail after his arrest, which allowed him to keep stealing.
Casey said Trotta drove, in May 2019, to a home the Atsuses used in Union, New Jersey, for storage for their business. Trotta ransacked the home, tried using tools to open a safe, destroyed cabinets trying to get the safe out of the basement, Casey said.
The next day, Joseph Atsus found the home in disarray and called local police.
"The government case is going to rise and fall or fall on Mr. Trotta's testimony and his testimony will be in conflict with the unchallengeable … fixed circumstantial evidence," Casey said.
