Two men stole Charlie Chaplin's coffin for ransom, and his widow refused to pay

Charlie Chaplin moved to Switzerland after the United States revoked his re-entry permit in 1952. He died at home in Corsier-sur-Vevey on Christmas Day 1977, aged 88. He left more than $100 million to his widow, Oona. He was buried in the village cemetery. On the night of 1-2 March 1978 his coffin was dug up and taken. The thieves, Roman Wardas, a 24-year-old Pole, and Gantcho Ganev, a 38-year-old Bulgarian, phoned the family with a ransom demand. Oona refused to pay. Police watched about 200 telephone kiosks and tapped the family's phone. They arrested the men, and on 17 May 1978, about 11 weeks after the theft, recovered the coffin from a field at Noville near Lake Geneva. In December 1978 Wardas was sentenced to about four and a half years of hard labour and Ganev to 18 months, suspended. Chaplin was reburied in the same cemetery in a reinforced concrete vault. In 2026 his film rights sit with Roy Export SAS, which owns most of his films after 1918, and his name and image rights with Bubbles Incorporated SA. Chaplin's World, a museum at his home, the Manoir de Ban, opened in April 2016 and has had about 2 million visitors.