Face it, if you design a gold toilet, you're kinda begging for it to be boosted at some point. You can't really be surprised when it happens:
Four men were charged Monday over the theft of an 18-carat gold toilet from Blenheim Palace, the sprawling English country mansion where British wartime leader Winston Churchill was born.
Yep, they yanked a gold toilet out of Winston Churchill's birthplace!
The toilet wasn't around when Churchill was busy saving England though:
The toilet, valued at 4.8 million pounds ($5.95 million), was an artwork titled "America" and intended as a pointed satire about excessive wealth by Italian conceptual artist Maurizio Cattelan. It was part of an art installation at Blenheim Palace, near the city of Oxford, a few days before it vanished overnight in September 2019.
It was originally installed in 2016, so it lasted a grand total of three years before being swiped. Three years is a long time for an 18-carat gold toilet!
It would be wrong of us to cover a story about a missing toilet without giving a nod to the people who rightly brought out the dad jokes.
The Crown Prosecution Service this week said it had "authorized criminal charges against four men, ages 35-39, over the theft." The blokes were "accused of burglary and conspiracy to transfer criminal property."
Notably, the toilet itself was "fully functioning," and if you had a mind to, you could book an appointment to use it while at Blenheim Palace. I mean, you know. If you wanted.
It was previously on display at the Guggenheim Museum, where you could also use it. Again, if that's your thing.
Police and crime commissioner Matthew Barber previously told the BBC that it was unlikely the toilet would ever be seen again. "If you have that large amount of gold I think it seems likely that someone has already managed to dispose of it one way or another," he said.
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