No Black Market for Artifacts

[Shannon Graham]

Collectors: No black market for American Indian artifacts; forum blasts federal raids

"SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) - The nation's largest and longest-running Indian artifact show opened last year under a cloud of fear and uncertainty as a federal investigation into the sale of Native American artifacts intensified throughout the Four Corners region.

Since then, suicide has claimed the government's informant and two defendants, the prehistoric Indian art market has bottomed out, some collectors' lives have been turned upside down and several federal indictments have resulted only in probation for some of those accused of plundering artifacts from federal lands.

Now, artifact dealers and collectors attending the 32nd annual Whitehawk Antique Show in Santa Fe are sharing their concerns over how the government handled the case and the way authorities are interpreting federal laws designed to protect the nation's archaeological sites and cultural heritage.

Dealers and collectors acknowledge that the operation helped eliminate what they called a "fringe criminal element" in the artifact market, but they vehemently denied claims by authorities that an underground black market exists.

"That is a total myth and it needs to be debunked right now," Owens said.

Owens and others also said that some of the raids went too far and the rights of honest collectors were trampled.


Full story found here.