Portland police announced its investigation into the stolen guitars led them to recover two of the guitars along with tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of other stolen items. The Portland Medium reported on this sad story several weeks ago. A 40 year old man was arrested for the crime.
Eric Michael Lamberton was charged with aggravated theft and burglary, among other charges. He has plead not guilty. The Oregon Music Hall of Fame discovered 72 of their signed guitars had been stolen. They kept the valuable items in a storage unit in northeast Portland.
Their storage unit broken into on Feb. 20. They said they were not notified of the break in until Feb. 28. Seventy guitars were stolen on which maybe 27 were archival guitars. Guitars are auctioned off each year to give four college-bound students a scholarship for music education. Funds are also used to bring music to schools that don’t offer music programs.
The guitars in question are top of the line. They range from Fender Stratocasters and Fender Squires to Gibsons with signatures from The Monkees, Lucinda Williams, Dave Mason and actor Tim Robbins. The org says that the ones that hurts the most are the archival guitars with the inductees on it. Many of those inductees have passed. Those cannot be replaced. Many in the community who read about this were saddened and some helped.
The organization is still holding out hope that the remaining guitars will be found. The org’s leader sent out a message to those who may have the stolen guitars: “If you have these guitars out there, you can bring them to me at the Music Millennium Store no questions asked,” he said. “You’ll be doing a great thing for music education and kids in the state of Oregon.”
The group’s fundraiser and biggest induction ceremony of the year is on Oct. 8 at the Aladdin Theater.
