For years, a con artist plagued the publishing industry, impersonating editors and agents to pull off hundreds of literary heists.
. But the manuscripts obtained from high-profile authors were never resold or leaked, rendering the thefts all the more perplexing.
In an emotional, four-page letter to Judge Colleen McMahon submitted earlier this month, Bernardini apologized for what he characterized as his “egregious, stupid and wrong” actions. He also offered insight into his motivations, which had long stymied victims and observers alike even after his plea. He spoofed an email address of someone he knew and mimicked his former colleagues' tone to ask for a manuscript that had yet to be published. The success of that deception turned his quest for ill-gotten books into “an obsession, a compulsive behaviour.”
As part of a bid to avoid prison, Bernardini's lawyers also submitted more than a dozen letters to the judge from his friends and family. In a novelistic twist of sorts, among them was a letter from a victim — writer Jesse Ball, the author of “Samedi the Deafness,” “Curfew” and “The Divers' Game.” In weighing arguments from the prosecution and defense, McMahon pushed back on the idea that the crime was victimless, with New York magazine's Vulture — the publication that brought the mystery to public attention with a 2021 story called “The Spine Collector” — reporting that “she was especially moved by a letter from a literary scout" who had been accused of Bernardini's crimes.
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Book thief in plot that duped famous authors avoids prisonIt was the stuff of novels: For years, a con artist plagued the publishing industry, impersonating editors and agents to pull off hundreds of literary heists
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