Tag: news

Customs’ seizes T-Rex skull in Jackson, Wyoming as part of ongoing investigation

According to this news report, and this one, Customs in Jackson, Wyoming, exercised a federal warrant to seize the skull of a Tarbosaurus from someone’s home. The story draws a parallel to another recent news item about the importation of dinosaur bones:

Federal officials recently seized a nearly complete Tarbosaurus skeleton that was sold at auction and arrested a Florida man for illegally importing dinosaur fossils.

A U.S. attorney for the president of Mongolia says that country welcomes the increased awareness for the illegal trade of Mongolian fossils.

Local 8 news.

According to the limited information in the News & Guide article, the fossil was seized for  failure to provide proper documentation that the export was done in compliance with the law.

That article also references a similar case involving a dinosaur skeleton in New York and Florida, and I would also draw the reader’s attention to the story I blogged about a few months ago in Detroit where seized fossils went unclaimed and were thereafter donated to the University of Michigan.

Maybe instead of devoting so much of my blogging lately to avoid having your currency seized I need to start focusing on avoiding having your fossils seized…

Detroit Customs donates seized fossils to University of Michigan

From the Detroit Free Press comes this story about U.S. Customs seizing hundreds of pre-historic fossils for an apparent failure to declare. The article does not make it clear if they were declared at all, or if there was a false declaration (e.g., declared imported for exhibition at a trade show instead of imported for sale). There is probably a reason why the importer(s) never filed a petition for remission to have the fossils returned.

An excerpt of the story follows, with my emphasis in bold:

The fossils — whose origins and age are unknown — were seized in March 2011 after two Canadian men at the Ambassador Bridge claimed they were attending a fossil trade show in Illinois.

A secondary inspection revealed several boxes containing more than 1,100 fossils that were for sale. They were seized because the unidentified men did not properly declare their goods.

[Customs spokesman Ken Hammond] said the agency tried to contact the men several times to reclaim the fossils and pay associated penalties, but they never got back in touch with customs and border protection.

Hammond did not now how much the penalties were. He said the men were not criminally charged. He did not know where the men acquired the fossils.

“The bad part that happened with these individuals is they didn’t declare their intentions to us,” Hammond said, adding that the men would have had to go through the proper importing process.

[ . . . ]

19 USC § 1497 subjects any article excluded in the declaration and entry made by the importer (and not mentioned before baggage inspection begins) to forfeiture. There could also be a monetary penalty under the same statute equal to the value of the fossils.

Customs can, and does, have authority to donate seized property in certain circumstances. Earlier this year, Customs donated $1.3 million worth of seized property to charities.