I picked one box up and busted it open - Oscar!

Willie Fullgear

The American Federal Bureau of Investigation was called in last week following the disappearance of the 55 statuettes.

Detective Robert Rivera loads Oscar into his patrol car

The gold statuettes went missing from a storage area in the city of Bell, south of Los Angeles, just nine days before the ceremony.

They were being shipped from Chicago to the organisers of the show - the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences - in Los Angeles when they disappeared.

Robert Rehme, president of the organisation, said he did not know whether the Oscars had been stolen or simply lost.

New consignment

A second consignment of Oscars was being prepared in Chicago and an Academy spokesman promised that the show would go on.

Oscar factfile

Made from alloy britannium Plated in copper, nickel silver, then 24-karat gold 13.5 inches tall, weighs 8.5lbs Designed by MGM's chief art director Cedric Gibbons The statuette features a knight holding a crusader's sword, standing on a reel of film

But Academy executive, Bruce Davis, would not give an arrival date for the new consignment.

"We're going to be a little coy about that just in case there's an Oscar gang out there," he said.

The disappearance of the awards was the second hitch in the run-up to the Academy Awards.

Earlier this month, 4,000 ballots mailed to voters in the Los Angeles area failed to arrive, and new ballots had to be sent out.