Last in ring of artifact thieves to be sentenced

Jace Radke

Thursday, Dec. 11, 2003 | 11:10 a.m.

Federal investigators are nearing the end of a case that has stretched over two years and led to a ring of relic hunters who were stealing pieces of the past.

Operation Indian Rocks resulted in the recovery of more than 10,000 artifacts taken from historic sites in Nevada, California and other Western states, in what law enforcement sources say is one of the largest archaeological resource cases ever investigated.

The value of the arrowheads, ancient corncobs, hammer-stones, clay figurine fragments and other objects was estimated to be nearly $416,000, but the real loss is incalculable, said Steve Daron, one of the archaeologists at the Lake Mead National Recreation Area.

"It's really sad to see this kind of activity going on, because it destroys the chance for future generations to see this history," Daron said. "There are questions that we may not be able to answer without the information that these artifacts and their environments can provide.

"It's something that is sacred, almost like the feeling you get about your childhood home. This is where our ancestors lived."

Federal authorities said that the last major defendant in the case, Nevada resident Bobbie Wilkie, is scheduled to be sentenced in Federal Court in Las Vegas on Monday.

Wilkie has pleaded guilty to two counts of excavation and removal of archaeological resources and aiding and abetting. Another defendant in the case, Frank Embrey, also took a plea deal in the case, and was sentenced in August to 18 months in prison and ordered to pay $86,196 in restitution.

Deanne Wilkie, Bobbie Wilkie's wife, is scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 12, after pleading guilty to similar charges, federal officials said.

Sources said that there are other defendants in related cases who have not yet been sentenced.

According to court documents, between December 1997 and December 2001 the Wilkie's and Embrey conspired to "unlawfully excavate, remove, damage and otherwise alter and deface archaeological resources located on designated, federal public lands."

The group used probes, trowels, buckets, sifting screens, shovels and other tools to search for items on public lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service and Nellis Air Force Base. A total of 13 sites were damaged, including some in Death Valley National Recreation Area, near Winnemucca Lake and a desert lake area in Southern Nevada controlled by the Air Force, according to a federal task force that investigated the thefts.

The defendants displayed the items at their homes and sold some of them, according to the federal indictment. Federal officials estimate that the items taken had a commercial value of $21,600 and that restoration and repair of damaged sites would cost more than $100,000.

Historic sites on public lands are protected by the 1906 Antiquities Act and the 1979 Archaeological Resource Protection Act, which makes it illegal to destroy or excavate these areas.

Those laws are the basis for prosecuting archaeological crimes, but once an artifact has been removed or damaged much of its historical value is lost, said Peter Ossorio, an assistant U.S. Attorney in New Mexico, who has prosecuted relic cases in the past.

"It's like somebody robbing a victim after the victim has already been mugged," Ossorio said. "Once these items are removed from the site you don't really ever get them back.

"Even if every single piece is returned much of the historical value is gone."

Daron said that the items can only be studied fully in relation to other items in the area they are found in, and that when relics are disturbed that relationship is destroyed.

"Generally speaking there is still some information we can glean from items that have been moved, but the majority is lost," Daron said. "These are limited resources, and once they're gone they're gone forever."

Items taken from sites that are recovered are generally used in museum displays or placed in federal collections, Daron said.

He said there are two basic types of looters: people who don't realize what they are doing when they take an item and professionals looking to sell what they find.

"You have the mom-and-pop type who are just hiking around and see something they think would be cool to take home," Daron said. "The organized looting is on a much larger scale where you have people out there digging holes and looking to make a profit."

Whether it's a Native American pot or spent Civil War ammunition found on a battlefield in Virginia, there is worldwide demand for remnants of the past.

Illegal trade in antiquities ranks as the world's fourth most-lucrative outlawed industry, after drugs, guns and money laundering, according to the Smithsonian Institution.

"You see Internet sites and catalogues out there selling artifacts," Daron said.

National parks stand out as a favored picking grounds for looters, because relics are generally better preserved on federal lands, said Greg Jablonski, a special agent with the park service.

Federal law enforcement officers patrol for looters, and are now receiving training in archeological crimes from the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Georgia. Education programs have been started to inform students about what can be destroyed if relics are taken.

Site locations are kept secret, but with millions of acres in public lands authorities cannot be everywhere at once. At Lake Mead National Recreation Area alone there are 1.5 million acres to patrol.

In the mid-1990s a piece of Southern Nevada history was damaged when petroglyphs were taken from a rock face at Katherine Landing, near Lake Mojave, using front-end loaders to remove the rock paintings. The petroglyphs were later returned, but they could not be put back into their natural setting, and are instead displayed at a ranger station.

That incident pales in comparison to what Operation Indian Rocks uncovered.

"It just boggles the mind when you think of more than 10,000 artifacts being taken," Ossorio said. "The historical and cultural loss is staggering."