Antiques dealer guilty in a second fraud case

Five years after making a courtroom apology for cheating people out of heirlooms and antiques, former

Antiques Roadshow

celebrity Russ Pritchard 3d admitted this week that he had done it again.

Pritchard, 44, of Beach Haven, N.J., pleaded guilty Wednesday to charges that he defrauded six people who had entrusted him with paintings, jewelry, furniture and other items to sell on consignment from a shop in Bryn Mawr.

"He never did what he promised to do," said Tracey Potere, an assistant district attorney in Montgomery County. "He kept the items, or never sold them, or he had an excuse where the items were."

Losses amounted to about $100,000.

Pritchard became known nationally in the 1990s as a regular appraiser on the popular PBS television series. He was tossed off the show after he was found to have faked some appraisals.

In July 2002, he was sentenced to a year in prison by a U.S. District Court judge in Philadelphia for the fraud involving the Civil War antiques. He served about nine months, his current attorney, Craig Kellerman, said yesterday.

By June 2004, Potere said, Pritchard was back in business in Bryn Mawr. The new charges related to incidents in 2004 and 2005.

Potere said Pritchard pleaded guilty to three felonies: deceptive business practices, theft by deception, and failure to make required disposition of funds. He is free on bail awaiting sentencing in about three months.

"He just wants the opportunity to make restitution and put this behind him," Kellerman said.

In 2002, Pritchard was ordered to pay $830,539 in restitution to five victims. Kellerman said Pritchard had not paid that money back.

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