LONDON, July 28 (UPI) -- A stolen bronze sculpture worth more than $400,000 was found chained to a fire escape in the London suburb of Streatham.
Detectives from Scotland Yard's art and antiques unit identified the sculpture, which stands nearly seven feet tall and was crafted by Helaine Blumenfeld, vice president of the Royal British Society of Sculptors.
The investigators were acting on information from staff at a gallery who reported a mysterious phone call regarding the missing piece, The Independent reported Saturday.
Commemorating the Holocaust and titled "Transformation -- Tree of Life," the work had been stolen from a warehouse in 2005 as it awaited shipment to Italy for exhibition.
"I always wondered what it was. It just turned up one day, a big lump of metal," Gene Phillips, a man from the neighborhood, told the British newspaper. "Then one day these police arrived and said it was a famous statue. I didn't have the faintest clue."
Scotland Yard said no arrests had been made.
The sculpture, one of 20 large statues and bronzes stolen across Britain in the past two years, is now sitting in a police warehouse awaiting collection by Blumenfeld.
