Brooklyn Plea Exposes a Counterfeit Art Ring That Reached Galleries Nationwide
A father-daughter art fraud case that moved through galleries and auction houses across the United States ended in federal court in Brooklyn on April 28, when Erwin Bankowski and Karoline Bankowska admitted to wire fraud conspiracy and misrepresenting Native American-produced goods. Prosecutors say the pair placed more than 200 counterfeit works into circulation between 2020 and 2025, using forged provenance, fabricated ownership histories, and fake certificates to make the works appear credible.
The case offers a stark view of how provenance fraud can be engineered. According to prosecutors, some of the false histories linked the works to private collections associated with the artists, while others pointed to galleries or corporate collections that had already closed, making verification difficult for dealers and buyers. In some instances, the defendants allegedly went further, creating custom gallery stamps, aging paper, and attaching certificates of authenticity to bolster the deception.
Among the works identified in the government’s announcement were pieces purportedly by Raimond Staprans, Banksy, Andy Warhol, and Richard Mayhew. The examples included a whitewashed seaside scene attributed to Staprans that sold for $60,000, a cardboard work protesting the Iraq War attributed to Banksy that sold for $2,000, a nude man and woman attributed to Warhol that sold for $5,500, and a color-block landscape attributed to Mayhew that sold for $160,000.
The Native American goods charges stem from the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990, which prohibits selling art or craft products in a way that falsely suggests Native American authorship. Prosecutors said the case also implicated the work of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which typically investigates such matters. Mayhew was of Black and Native American heritage, and Fritz Scholder was of Native American heritage.
Joseph Nocella, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said the defendants had presented themselves as sellers of fine art while trafficking in fraud. Doug Ault, assistant director at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said the scheme harmed buyers, Native American artists, and the integrity of the market itself.
Bankowski and Bankowska, both Polish citizens, face up to 20 years in prison and at least $1.9 million in restitution. They are scheduled to be sentenced on Aug. 5 and face deportation after serving their sentences.
