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Stolen petroglyphs are returning to Nevada site
U.S. Forest Service officials never believed John Ligon's claim that he dug up three boulders etched with American Indian petroglyphs four years ago to put them in his front yard for safekeeping. But they did share a concern he voiced that someone would steal the centuries-old rock art on national forest land a few football fields away from a growing housing development. After they recovered the stolen property, federal land managers struggled with the question of what to do with the rock etchings of a bighorn sheep, an archer, a lizard and a wheel.
Now, after initially thinking it was best to place them in a state museum, the agency - in consultation with local tribal leaders - has decided to return them to the mountainside.
"It belongs out there," said Lynda Shoshone, cultural resources director for the Washoe Tribe in Nevada and California. She and others said removing the petroglyphs from the site takes them out of their spiritual context. "...it is a tough decision on our part ...," Shoshone said. "But I've come to the conclusion that maybe the more we educate John Q. Public at the sites, the more they will help us preserve stuff like this."
Under an agreement with local tribes, the Forest Service intends to return the petroglyphs to that spot this fall, along with fences around the rocks and interpretive signs.
As those legally responsible for protecting the artifacts under the Archaeological Resources Protection Act, federal land managers have been wary of returning such items to the field. They've been even more squeamish about publicizing the sites on maps and downright fearful of marking them with interpretive signs.
"Putting up a sign at an archaeological site is almost like saying, `Dig here for buried treasure,"' Frampton [Forest Service Archaeologist] said in an interview during the trial.
"A sign protects a place from law-abiding people. It doesn't protect the site from the non-law-abiding people," he said. "On the other hand, if there is no sign, how would the public know it is illegal to do something to the site?"
Ligon of Reno and co-defendant Carroll Mizell of Van Nuys Calif. insisted that all they wanted to do was protect the artifacts. They said they had no idea they were on national forest land, let alone prohibited from removing the petroglyphs.
In the end, their motivation had nothing to do with their guilt or innocence. After the federal jury in Reno convicted them of theft of government property, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the verdict partly because the Justice Department failed to prove the men knew or should have known what they were stealing was of archaeological value.
The two men ended up paying civil fines totaling $21,523, money which is being used to finance the site's restoration.
Frampton said it was a tour of the site with tribal leaders that convinced him putting the petroglyphs back on the mountain might work. On their way to the site, a Forest Service law officer approached in an unmarked vehicle and asked what they were up to. ... they invited him to join them.
Later, the officer's cell phone rang. It was another law officer explaining that a neighbor watching the site had called about the activity there.
"It may be our savior in the end - the people who are right next door."
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