Fernando Alfaro accepted a plea deal on one count of grand theft after the paintings, valued at $6.7m (�3.7m), were stolen in December 2002.

He told the judge, through a Spanish interpreter, he was accepting the offer "because I don't want to go to trial."

Police said the paintings, by Monet and Renoir, were stolen in Florida.

Undercover police

Alfaro, 48, would have faced a maximum sentence of 30 years if convicted of grand theft.

A second grand theft count and two counts of dealing in stolen property were dropped by the state.

Alfaro was sentenced to a total of three years and nine months, but will receive credit for time spent in jail since his arrest with two accomplices in February 2003.

The 1880 Claude Monet work titled Paysage a Vetheuil and Auguste Renoir's 1893 painting A La Place de Trinite, were stolen from a beachside mansion in Naples, Florida.

Police later arrested the three men in Miami after they tried to sell the artworks to undercover officers for $1m (�552.2m). The paintings were recovered.

Earlier this month, Rigoberto Gonzalez, 34, and Carlos Suomanos, 38, were sentenced to two years each under plea bargains, also with credit for time in jail.

Suomanos will serve a concurrent 10-year term in federal prison on unrelated drug charges.