It has been roughly one year since Tom Brady’s game-worn jersey went missing in one of the most bizarre sports memorabilia heists of all time, and security staffers at this year’s Super Bowl are going to great lengths to make sure it does not happen again.
On Sunday morning, Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk noted that security at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minnesota was scanning the credentials of reporters both when they entered restricted areas and when they left them.
They’re scanning credentials coming and going today, thanks to the guy who stole Tom Brady’s jersey last year.
— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) February 4, 2018
Brady’s jersey was infamously stolen from inside the locker room after the Patriots beat the Falcons in Super Bowl LI last year. The man who took it — a member of the press — returned to Mexico and has been able to avoid legal trouble, but he has been banned from attending Super Bowls and any other NFL events for life. A surreal surveillance video that was released after the game showed the reporter, Muricio Ortega, confidently strolling into New England’s locker room and exiting with something tucked under his left arm. You can see the footage here.
When a fan helped the FBI find Ortega in Mexico, authorities discovered that he had also stolen Brady’s jersey from the Patriots’ Super Bowl win over the Seahawks two years prior. In some ways, Ortega nearly pulled off the perfect heist. The act seems unlikely to be repeated at Super Bowl LII.
