A New York man charged with illegally acquiring a Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot portrait that was found in the bushes across the street from the Metropolitan Museum of Art is scheduled to go on trial Sept. 12

U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in Manhattan, who set the trial date yesterday, warned Thomas A. Doyle, who is accused of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, not to miss any more court dates. He shouldn’t have refused an order earlier this month by the U.S. Marshals Service to attend court, she said.

“If the marshals tell you to go, you go,” McMahon said. “This never happens again.”

Doyle’s lawyer, Donald Duboulay, told reporters that Doyle, who is incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, wasn’t feeling well the morning of April 13, when the status conference was initially scheduled. Doyle knew that Duboulay was involved in a trial at the time, his lawyer said.

Duboulay said his client will probably go to trial, rather than plead guilty to a lesser charge.

“That’s what the innocent do,” he said.

Corot’s 1857-58 “Portrait of a Girl” already had attracted tabloid press coverage by the time Doyle was arrested. A self-described co-owner of the painting and friend of Doyle, Kristyn Trudgeon, had filed a lawsuit in August claiming that another man she and Doyle hired to sell the artwork lost it after a night of heavy drinking in midtown Manhattan.