Issue No. 591
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20 - 26 June 2002 Issue No. 591 Home news |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Recommend this page | ||
Smuggler behind bars
DISGRACED New York antiquities dealer Frederick Schultz, 47, who was convicted in a Manhattan federal district court on 12 February of conspiring to smuggle and possess looted Egyptian artefacts, was sentenced on 11 June to 33 months in prison and fined $50,000, writes Jenny Jobbins.
"[Schultz] was stealing these objects in every sense of the word... Frankly, I think the evidence is overwhelming [that] in these circumstances he was no different than an ordinary thief," Judge Jed S Rakoff said. Schultz could have faced a 41-month sentence and a fine of $575,000, but Judge Rakoff noted that for white-collar offenders the main deterrent against crime was prison time rather than a fine.
The length of the sentence was determined in part by the amount of economic damage, which Schultz's counsel placed at $70,000 and the Egyptian government claimed was many millions. After examining sale and inventory records, the US government finally settled on a figure of $2 million.
Egyptian Law No. 117 of 1983, known as the Antiquities Law, was invoked in the case, the first time in US legal history that a defendant had been indicted under a foreign law.
"This was a very important ruling because it is the first time an American court has applied Egyptian law -- indeed the first time in the world that a country has made a prosecution under a foreign law," Supreme Council of Antiquities Director-General Zahi Hawass told Al-Ahram Weekly. "This has come because the US is keen on protecting global cultural heritage."
Hawass praised Assistant US Attormey Marcia Isaacson for her interpretation of the Egyptian law, as well as the archaeologists who had testified in court. He also commented that as a result of the case two other archaeologists -- one British and one American -- would in future be barred from working in Egypt.
Reports from the US say Schultz is expected to be held at the federal facility in Allenwood, Pennsylvania, dubbed Club Fed, where white-collar criminals often serve their sentences. He will be placed on probation for two years after he is released.
Schultz's trial was the last of five resulting from Scotland Yard's investigations into the activities of a prolific British smuggler of Egyptian antiquities, Jonathan Foreman. According to the reports Foreman, a former cavalry officer with a degree from Cambridge, changed his name to the less prosaic "Jonathan Tokeley-Parry" and in the early 1990s went on to steal more than 2,000 ancient artefacts from Egypt.
According to testimony given at the trial, Schultz sent large payments to Tokeley-Parry who, with the aid of Egyptian accomplices, smuggled the antiquities by air to Switzerland disguised as reproductions.
One of the objects smuggled by Tokeley-Parry was a granite head (right), which is either of Queen Nefetari, beloved wife of Ramses II, or of Princess Meret- Amun, his daughter.
Tokeley-Parry, who has served a six-year term in a British prison for his part in the illegal dealings, testified against Schultz. He said in evidence that after receiving the goods, the dealer faked old labels out of paper stained with tea and baked in an oven.
The members of the smuggling ring have now received a total of 12 convictions and more than 100 years of prison time across three continents.
Schultz's attorneys indicated they would appeal against the verdict.
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