Like diamonds, art can be used as a portable valuable commodity to illicitly transfer value to another jurisdiction.  The following seven Egyptian artifacts were for instance, stolen from the Bijbels Museum in Amsterdam on July 29, 2007 and then ultimately transferred to a New York City auction house:

The seven artifacts depicted above were however, recovered by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”), according to a May 27 press release.  ICE recovered them by working with the New York office of the Art Loss Register.  ICE similarly worked with the Art Loss Register to interdict a Pompeii wall panel fresco on June 1.  In another case resolved by ICE on June 1, Corinthian pottery was recovered.  The fresco and pottery had been separately stolen in Italy and were then transferred to New York City.  Both items are respectively pictured below:

Images: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement

Copyright 2009 Fred L. Abrams