An unusual auction will be taking place today in Belfast, Ireland, where over a 1000 pieces of rare sci-fi memorabilia will go under the hammer. The items in question have been seized by the police from a couple who built up this sizeable collection using their ill-gotten gains.
The 55-year old woman from West Yorkshire pleaded guilty last December to stealing £2.3 million from her employer, a Halifax-based firm that supplies commercial laundry equipment, over a seven year period between 2005 and December 2012.
Her 48-year old husband pleaded guilty to laundering £924,190 of the stolen cash, between July 2009 and December 2012.
On instructions from West Yorkshire Police, Wilsons Auctions in Northern Ireland is putting the collection up for sale today with no reserve price on any of the items.
Aidan Larkin, assets recovery manager at Wilsons, said that the auction presented a “once in a lifetime” opportunity for sci-fi fans.
“These items come around very, very rarely. It’s rare for such a large, significant collection of these items to become available. Normally at the specialist toy auctions there are one or two items of a certain range – we have complete waves of toys that were produced.”
Among the items being auctioned off are Scotty’s jacket, a replica Millennium Falcon from Star Wars and remote control Daleks. The most valuable items in the collection according to Mr Larkin are the six Star Trek costumes.
“We have been informed when the costumes last changed hands in Christie’s Auction in New York a few years ago, the couple in question spent 27,000 dollars on these costumes” Larkin said.
The auction gets under way at 6:30 PM in Wilsons’ headquarters in Mallusk in north Belfast.
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