In what was originally thought to be a robbery, after jeweler Jonathan Birnbach of J. Birnbach Inc. told police he hid the three boxes in a safe, it was discovered that workers accidentally threw out the $5 million batch of jewelry while helping him move to another floor.
Initially, sources told the New York Daily News that Birnbach often kept his safe unlocked during business hours to facilitate easy access to other jewels kept in the safe.
The jewelry which had been stuffed inside three weathered wooden boxes was, however, ignorantly thrown into a garbage heap by the workers, according to law enforcement sources.
Later that day, Wilfred Martinez, a building security guard was patrolling the third floor and discovered the expensive stones inside the boxes placed in the garbage heap.
Without skipping a beat, the 47-year-old sold some of his newly discovered treasure to a jeweler in the same building, while opting to keep the 17-carat diamond worth $3.2 million also found in the boxes.
Upon reviewing surveillance video from Nov. 24, police saw Martinez grab the boxes containing the jewelry from the third-floor hallway.
Since then, Martinez has turned over the jewelry in his possession and $10,000 in cash to the police. The authorities are attempting to locate the rest of the missing stones, law enforcement sources said.
Martinez has subsequently been charged with criminal possession of stolen property. When he appeared before Judge Melissa Crane in the Manhattan Criminal Court on Tuesday, his bail was set at $100,000.
