One really cannot grasp the significance of this kind of "event" until it happens to YOU. Jim, I'm with you in spirit, I know the feeling and the experience. Like you say, the paper work and having to figure out what was what and what you had.
Good luck, and cling to the thought that there is a higher law of reciprocity, call it Karma if you like, that will revisit and repay the culprits many times over.