What a shame that people can’t leave artifacts alone so all people can enjoy them where they won’t be destroyed by improper handling. Please do what you can to ensure that America’s history is preserved by reporting anyone who you see take things that do not belong to them to a park ranger. I have always loved archeology and have always enjoyed looking at artifacts that have been recovered, but would never contemplate pilfering from a national park or any other area that belongs to someone else. Corie Marks
USA Today
Jan. 23, 2008 04:32 PM
Looting of archaeological artifacts and fossils from national parks is increasing as the demand for such items rises on the Internet and the world market, U.S. National Park Service officials say.
About 340 looting incidents considered "significant" are reported each year at the 391 national parks, monuments, historic sites and battlefields - probably less than 25 percent of the actual number of violations, says National Park Service staff ranger Greg Lawler. "The trends are up," he says.
"The theft of archaeological and paleontological resources is a chronic problem that we simply have not even been able to get a grasp on," says Mark Gorman, chief ranger at South Dakota's Badlands National Park. "There's just insufficient resources."
Park service investigators search Web sites for looted artifacts and the FBI helps track items, some of which make their way to collectors in Europe and Asia. Prices are increasing for some items, including Native American pottery and garments, says Bonnie Magness-Gardiner, manager of the FBI's art theft program.
The most coveted items can cost "in the tens of thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars," she says. Thieves caught last year at Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park sold a Confederate belt buckle for $3,300 and buttons for $200 each.
The park service has 1,500 law enforcement rangers and 400 seasonal rangers - one for about every 56,000 acres. "We really don't have enough manpower," Lawler says.
That can make it difficult to catch criminals such as the three men who dug 460 holes at the Fredericksburg-Spotsylvania military park in search of artifacts and the man who pleaded guilty to taking 252 relics last year from Colorado's Mesa Verde National Park.
Under the 1979 Archaeological Resources Protection Act, first-time felony offenders can be fined up to $20,000 and imprisoned for a year.
Todd Swain, a National Park Service special agent, says the problem is far worse than statistics show. In a report he wrote for the 2007 "Yearbook of Cultural Property Law " he concluded, "The true scope of the looting problem is staggering. ... Our shared cultural heritage is disappearing before our eyes."