Collector's artifacts returning to Panama
(oregonlive.com) Artifacts believed to have been smuggled out of Panama by an Oregon man who fancied himself an Indiana Jones type were returned Tuesday to representatives of the Central American country.
The items, uncovered recently in the Klamath Falls area, include more than 100 pieces of pottery and some gold items dating to the pre-Columbian period between 1100 and 1500 A.D.
They were returned to the Panamanian government during a ceremony at the FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C.
The Panamanians were thrilled to have the artifacts back but were concerned that they were illegally dug up and taken out of the country in the first place, said Bonnie Magness-Gardiner, manager of the FBI's art-theft program.
According to a search warrant affidavit, the artifacts were illegally dug up by John Shaw while he was teaching at a U.S. military base in Panama in the 1980s.
Shaw, who died at 60 from a heart attack in 2004, "frequently boasted of being an 'Indian Jones' type of treasure hunter," the affidavit said.
It's not clear exactly where he dug up the pieces, but in one photo mentioned in the affidavit, Shaw stands in an open grave holding a golden tree frog. Another shows Shaw, his wife, Panama native Fatima Shaw, and their son in a boat "so laden with items that the top of the sides of the boat were nearly at the water line."
The affidavit said the couple smuggled the artifacts out of the country in the late 1980s after the U.S. bombed that country. Attempts to reach Fatima Shaw Tuesday were unsuccessful.
The couple ended up in Klamath Falls, where they owned the Pelican Pawn Shop, the affidavit said.
Though the couple held on to more than 100 items, they sold others at markets and on the Internet, the FBI said.
The artifacts included decorated pottery -- mostly cooking and serving pots -- along with gold pieces and figurines. Though a few items had been broken, most were in good shape, Magness-Gardiner said.
The FBI received a tip about the artifacts from an ex-boyfriend of the widow. The man ended up storing most of the items in a trailer at his Klamath Falls-area business as collateral for a loan he made to Fatima Shaw, now 46.
The remaining collection was valued at more than $5,000 by Jeffrey Quilter, a specialist at Harvard, according to the affidavit.
"This is not an Indiana Jones story," said Magness-Gardiner. The theft strips Panamanians of their cultural heritage, she said.
Abey Saied, deputy chief of mission at the Embassy of Panama, who received the items during Tuesday's ceremony, said in an e-mail that the artifacts' "national, historical and cultural significance is invaluable."
The 1972 Panama constitution and a 1982 law make owning Panamanian antiquities illegal.
The FBI said Shaw willingly handed over the items, and no charges are expected.
Although Panama now has many of the artifacts back, a piece of its history has been lost forever.
"Once you remove these things from their context it's impossible to reconstruct the history that deposited them there in the first place," Magness-Gardiner said.
"Once they're removed there's no knowledge of where they came from or what they were doing there or how they got there or what their meaning was in the cultural sequence of Panama."
Lynne Terry: 503-221-8503; lynneterry@news.oregonian.com
