[Kip Currier: A very troubling story that will serve as a springboard for my 3/20/18 lecture/discussion of public relations crisis management in my Managing and Leading Information Services course. A few weeks ago, I gave a lecture I've been doing the past 10 years+ on "Managing Legal Issues in Libraries and Information Centers" that includes a geographically diverse "Rogues' Gallery" (props to DC Comics' The Flash comic book for the memorable appellation!) of persons identified over the past decade, who have been alleged to have committed library-related infractions and have been convicted of library-related crimes. The individual (or individuals) who perpetrated this brazen theft of rare books from the venerable Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh's Main Library and breach of public trust can be added to the Rogues' Gallery if/when apprehended and adjudicated.]
"Mr. Vinson believes that the thief may have been a library employee or employees because only a handful of people knew the security procedures.
“The books were immensely valuable. But they were also across a wide variety of fields,” he said.” Only a few people have that knowledge — a general antiquarian bookseller, a librarian or a curator would know the value. It has inside written all over it.”"