Who would have the audacity to steal one of the most valuable pieces of Hollywood memorabilia and lore from a small town festival honoring one of its local heroes? What was their motive? How did it take investigators so long to find the shoes? All of this is detailed in the new documentary Ruby Red Handed: Stealing America’s Most Famous Pair of Shoes which started streaming on Hulu on Aug. 26.
Viewers learn that every year, the annual Judy Garland Festival takes place in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, where the actress was born and raised for the first four years of her life. That young girl went on to become a legend in the industry, starring in movies like The Wizard of Oz (1939), Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), and even A Star Is Born (1954).
Shaw was happy to lend the shoes to the festival in 2004. But overnight, a thief broke into the museum, smashed the glass showcase, and stole the ruby red slippers, leaving no fingerprints or evidence behind. Subjects in the documentary refer to them as “the most famous shoes in the world” and said this was “one of the biggest heists of all time.”
“What makes the ruby slippers so valuable is not necessarily what they are but what they represent,” Shaw said in the documentary.
Terry Martin, who had a long history of criminal behavior, admitted to having stolen the slippers. But at age 76, he avoided jail time because he was living in hospice. Instead he served one-year supervised release and paid $23,500 in restitution to the Judy Garland Museum. Martin’s accomplice Jerry Hal Saliterman was also charged in March 2024 with one count of theft, but then the 77-year-old died in 2025.
After Shaw was reunited with the slippers, they were then auctioned off in December 2024. The documentary reveals that Heritage Auctions sold the shoes for an astonishing and unfathomable amount: $32.5 million. Although the Judy Garland Museum attempted to raise enough money to purchase the shoes, $32.5 million was an insurmountable sum. Still, they didn’t want to go home empty-handed, so they ended up spending $20,000 on Bill Mack’s painting of the ruby red slippers.
The mystery around Hollywood’s most famous ruby red slippers continues, though. Despite the fact that they were located after a lengthy investigation, the buyer’s identity at the recent auction still hasn’t been publicly revealed, so we still don’t know who is in possession of the most famous shoes in Hollywood history.
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