Daniel Sikkema, the estranged husband of murdered New York art dealer Brent Sikkema, was found guilty Friday in a Manhattan federal court, according to the Wall Street Journal. Daniel Sikkema faced charges tied to a murder-for-hire plot that prosecutors said led to the dealer’s killing at his vacation home in Rio de Janeiro in 2024.
The case has gripped the art world since Brent Sikkema, the founder of the Chelsea gallery then known as Sikkema Jenkins & Co., was found stabbed to death in Brazil at age 75. Prosecutors argued that Daniel Sikkema orchestrated the killing from New York amid a bitter divorce and custody dispute involving the couple’s son.
Federal prosecutors accused Daniel Sikkema of hiring Alejandro Triana Prevez, a Cuban former security officer living in Brazil, to carry out the murder. According to court filings and testimony presented during the trial, Prevez entered Brent Sikkema’s Rio townhouse in the early hours of January 14, 2024, grabbed a kitchen knife, and stabbed the dealer 18 times while he slept.
Jurors convicted Daniel Sikkema on three counts related to conspiring to hire and pay a hitman. Prosecutors said he secretly transferred roughly $9,000 to Prevez before and after the killing, then attempted to conceal their connection from investigators and friends. His lawyers argued the payments were unrelated to the murder and stemmed from past work Prevez had done for the couple in Cuba.
The killing stunned the contemporary art world. Brent Sikkema was widely respected as a dealer with a sharp eye for emerging artists and helped build the careers of figures including Kara Walker, Vik Muniz, Jeffrey Gibson, and Sheila Hicks. His gallery later changed its name to Sikkema Malloy Jenkins following his death.
The investigation quickly stretched across Brazil and the United States. Brazilian authorities arrested Prevez shortly after the killing, and he later claimed Daniel Sikkema had offered him money to murder the dealer. Daniel Sikkema was formally charged in New York last year with murder-for-hire and conspiracy offenses that carried the possibility of a life sentence.
Daniel Sikkema now faces a mandatory life sentence. A sentencing date has not yet been announced.
