The Associated Press
STILLWATER, Minn. — A bronze statue of Crazy Horse that was stolen from a South Dakota museum a decade ago has been recovered, authorities said Monday. An investigator for the Crazy Horse Memorial Foundation told the Washington County Sheriff’s Office that the statue, valued at more than $40,000, was in Stillwater Township, said Capt. Don McGlothlin. Authorities found the 3-foot, 90-pound statue last week. The statue is one of 10 by Korczak Ziolkowski. It is a model for the monument being carved out of stone on a hillside in the Black Hills. The Crazy Horse Foundation had received anonymous information in July that a Stillwater Township man who attended an artists workshop stole the statue. Washington County authorities were notified, and the statue was recovered from the suspect last Tuesday. ‘‘They were extremely happy to find we found it,’’ Sgt. Gary Swanson said. ‘‘It’s a beautiful piece of art.’’ Ziolkowski, who won a first prize in sculpture at the 1939 World’s Fair, started working on the monument to the storied Indian leader in 1949. The artist died in 1982 and his children took over the project. The man who had the statue is under investigation on suspicion of possessing stolen property, Swanson said.
http://www.gwinnettdailyonline.com/
Historic docket returned to Erie County
April 2, 2003, 3:44 PM EST
BUFFALO, N.Y. -- A historic court docket pulled from the auction site eBay amid suspicions it was stolen has been returned to its owners.
The original court docket from Leon Czolgosz's trial for the 1901 assassination of President William McKinley is now in the possession of Erie County officials. The docket was discovered missing from the county courthouse after a Buffalo attorney noticed it had been put up for auction.
An auction house in Greenwich, Conn., had expected the single-page document would fetch as much as $6,000. It canceled Saturday's sale after learning the document might have been stolen from the Erie County Courthouse.
Prosecuting anyone for the theft will be difficult, District Attorney Frank Clark said, because it is unknown when the docket was stolen.
Czolgosz was an anarchist who came to Buffalo from Cleveland to assassinate McKinley during the Pan-American Exposition. As McKinley shook hands of well-wishers on Sept. 6, 1901, Czolgosz stepped forward with a handkerchief covering a revolver and shot the president twice in the stomach. McKinley died a week later.
http://www.newsday.com/
UNESCO Fears Iraqi Heritage Razed By Strikes
A file photo of the ancient museum of Mosul which was targeted by U.S. and British aircraft
PARIS, April 2 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - The U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) said Wednesday, April 2, it has received "alarming information" that historical sites in Iraq may have been damaged by continuous Anglo-American bombings, despite numerous pleas for Washington to preserve them.
"Unfortunately, we have alarming information on a number of sites that could have already been damaged by the bombings and fighting," said Monir Buchenaki, Algerian archaeologist and UNESCO assistant cultural manager.
"We have received information indicating that the museum of Tikrit (the hometown of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein) has been damaged, as well as the museum of Mosul and a palace in Baghdad containing a collection of objects from the monarchy," Buchenaki added.
There was also concern about the sites in southern Basra, as well as An-Najaf and Karbala, two sacred Shiite towns, Agence France-Presse (AFP) quoted Buchenaki as elaborating.
"Mesopotamia and the Abbasid caliphate are jewels of civilisation. That is why we constantly raise the alarm not just about casualties, but also warn that cultural heritage that must not be destroyed," he added.
Buchenaki had sent a previous letter on behalf of UNESCO a month ago to warn the United States of the importance of conserving Iraq's cultural heritage.
He accompanied it with a map, as well as a list of museums in Iraq. The American supervisor at UNESCO who received this warning assured Buchenaki "that all the observations were relayed to the authorities responsible for carrying out operations."
At a press conference on Wednesday, Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saif al-Sahhaf accused American and British forces of bombing mosques and deliberately destroying religious site at An-Najaf and Kerbala.
He said that the U.S. troops are trying to destroy the most sacred tombs of the Shiites in the two holy cities.
Sahhaf further charged the Anglo-Americans troops of trying to destroy the tombs of Imams Ali and Hussein in An-Najaf and Karbala by sending warplanes screeching low over the holy sites, and warned of a Shiite outcry.