2 men are charged with stealing a famous Banksy artwork from a London gallery

LONDON (AP) — Two men have been charged with burglary over the theft of an artwork by street artist Banksy that was taken in a smash-and-grab raid on a London gallery.

The Metropolitan Police force said Friday that Larry Fraser, 47, and James Love, 53, are alleged to have taken “Girl with Balloon” from the Grove Gallery on Sunday night.

The suspects appeared at Wimbledon Magistrates’ Court on Thursday and were ordered detained until their next hearing on Oct. 9.

Surveillance camera footage showed a masked man smashing a glass door before dashing in and taking the picture from a wall. Police said they have recovered the work, which is valued in court documents at 270,000 pounds ($355,000). Nothing else was reported stolen.

The stolen work is one of several versions of “Girl with Balloon,” a stenciled image of a child reaching for a heart-shaped red balloon. Originally stenciled on a wall in east London, the picture has been endlessly reproduced, becoming one of Banksy’s best-known images.

Another version partially self-destructed during a 2018 auction, passing through a shredder hidden in its frame just after it was purchased for 1.1 million pounds ($1.4 million) at Sotheby’s.

The self-shredded work, retitled “Love is in the Bin,” sold for 18.6 million pounds ($25.4 million at the time) in 2021.

Gallery manager Lindor Mehmetaj said he was “horrified and petrified” by the theft and grateful to have the picture back.

“We are very lucky, but it is very unusual to have it recovered,” he said, adding that the crime may have increased the work's value.

“Typically when fine art and masterpieces are stolen, the financial value can skyrocket," Mehmetaj said. “Hopefully, it is going to be the same for this Banksy."

Bansky, who has never confirmed his full identity, began his career spray-painting buildings in Bristol, England, and has become one of the world’s best-known artists. His mischievous and often satirical images include two policemen kissing, armed riot police with yellow smiley faces and a chimpanzee with a sign bearing the words, “Laugh now, but one day I’ll be in charge.”

His paintings and installations sell for millions of dollars at auction and have drawn thieves and vandals.

This summer a series of animal-themed stencils showed up around London. One of them, a howling wolf on a satellite dish, was removed by a masked man less than an hour after it was confirmed as authentic. An image of a gorilla at London Zoo and piranhas in a police sentry box in London’s financial district were both removed by the authorities for safekeeping.

A Banksy painting, Girl With Balloon, on display at the Grove Gallery in London after it was stolen on Sunday, then recovered and returned to the gallery, Friday Sept. 13, 2024. (James Manning/PA via AP)

FILE - A staff member poses for photographs with a print of "Girl with Balloon, 2004" by British street artist Banksy, at Bonhams auction house in London, Monday, Nov. 8, 2021. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, File)

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — The U.S. Department of Energy announced Tuesday that it is teaming up with yet another energy company as part of a mission to transform portions of government-owned property once used for the nation's nuclear weapons program into prime real estate for renewable energy endeavors.

The federal agency will be negotiating a lease agreement with Florida-based NextEra Energy Resources Development for nearly 3 square miles (7.8 square kilometers) of land surrounding the nation's only underground repository for nuclear waste.

The project at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in southern New Mexico is the latest to be announced by the Energy Department, which has identified more than 50 square miles (130 square kilometers) of government land that can be used for constructing solar arrays and battery storage systems that can supply utilities with emissions-free electricity.

Other lease agreements already are being negotiated for projects stretching from the Hanford Site in Washington state, where the U.S. produced plutonium, to national laboratories and other sites in Idaho, Nevada and South Carolina.

Andrew Mayock with the White House Council on Environmental Quality on Tuesday echoed a statement made earlier this year when the first negotiations were announced. He said federal agencies are using their scale and purchasing power to support the growth of the clean energy industry.

"We will spur new clean electricity production, which is good for our climate, our economy, and our national security,” he said.

At the nuclear repository in New Mexico, federal officials say there is potential to install at least 150 megawatts of solar and another 100 megawatts of storage.

While the amount of energy generated by NextEra at the WIPP site would be more than enough to meet the needs of the repository, none would feed directly into government operations there. Officials said the energy from the solar array would be sold to Xcel Energy by NextEra and put into the utility's distribution system.

Xcel serves customers in parts of New Mexico and Texas, as well as other states.

Officials said there is no estimate of when ground could be broken, saying engineering and planning work would be needed once a lease is signed and regulatory approvals would be required.

The largest of the so called cleanup-to-clean-energy projects is slated for the Hanford Site, where Hecate Energy LLC has plans to deliver a gigawatt-scale system that would span thousands of acres on the southeastern edge of the property. It could be several years before that project comes online.

FILE - The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant is seen, March 6, 2014, near Carlsbad, N.M. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan, File)