Raiding the Tomb Raiders

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T HE ANTIQUITIES SMUGGLING TRIALS OF FORMER GETTY MUSEUM CURATOR MARION TRUE and dealer Robert E. Hecht, who sold the Metropolitan Museum of Art a late-sixth-century B.C. vase painted by Euphronios for $1 million in 1972, continue in Rome (see archaeology.org). Meanwhile, the Met has agreed to return some two dozen ancient Greek and Roman works,.including the Euphronios vase, to Italy, which claimed that they were looted. And that's not all. The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston is said to be in negotiations for the return of pieces from its collection that the Italians say were stolen. Italy is also pursuing artifacts in the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Princeton Museum of Art, the Toledo Museum of Art, and the private collection of the late Leon Levy and his wife, Shelby White, in New York. Italy's legal offensive is based on mountains of evidence-thousands of antiquities, photographs, and documents--seized from looters and dealers in a series of dramatic raids by the Art Squad of the Carabinieri (a police force within the Italian army). In their new book The Medici Conspiracy: The IllicitJwrney ofLoodAntiquitia,fiom Italy's Tmb Raiden to the Worldi Greatest Museums, excerpted below, journalists Peter Watson and Cecelia Todeschini detail the investigations led by Roberto Conforti, who has commanded the Art Squad since 1990. nu\ aly cracked the rle~wuik of looters, s~~~ugglers, c111d dealers -A supplying American museums donforti applied his consiikrable experkme fighting organized crt;me to the task of breaking t h illicit antiquities network. His approach was to patientlygathr evidme, identify those involved, and put pressure on lav-level operatwes to turn on those above them in the chain. &te intervened, owever, and put the investigation on afast track: .I P . 1 . . ASQUALE CAMERA WAS A big man, weighing in at a little under 400 pounds, and as this . . ,, -... .! suggests, he liked his food and he liked his drink. On August 31, 1995, a Thursday, he :,-.I. , ... , ; I . - .,, took his lunch at Luciano's Restaurant in Santa Maria & Capua Vetere, a small town north of .:I,,. ; . : i;, ,,:. .-.. -I Naples. He then set out on the Al, the Autostrada del Sole, Italy's main north-south freeway, .>j .- . ,:'., i ;.\,u,.! ;::= - > .. .. to drive to Rome. The Carabinieri didn't follow~him. They knew where he was headed-his . . : , : . ,. -, 1 . ,. . , , . . ? * . J , . ! . > , apartment in Rome. , . : .. . . , . . . ,.,. ., The day was hot and sulhry. Sometime between 2:30 and 3:00 p.m., just as he was approach- , ,., ,: ,, 2.;r,. : < I.:.!:,, . ,.:?!, , .. . . .. . . ;.. " i..-.J 7 . , )." . . I .:: $:* . .. :$,:. , :$ ;:;.:. .;:, ;, .:,. . h:zqi .: .? . +:. . - ., ,. --::A .. . : . ,.,. . , ,, .i:.-.-.?L;h; .. . / : ,i .. 8 .: ..:,/. ._ ! . '..(., L,;., , . . '. . !. . , 4 . at'? ?i ,.;I;. ,;;I;.+;!. ,::i,;j; I,;:.;i..? :. , .,;I,; . . , '. . , . ,' r,'I , ;.--! cj';!:::r. :, !,. .,. r! , .-'I. :- ing the exit for Cassino, with the great stone hill of Monte Cassino and its historic Benedictine . . . . . - .. . . monastery looming above, Camera's car left the road, smashed into the guard rail and over- ~i turned. Camera was killed instantly. There were rumors, later, that his car had been interfered !?$.;;..;i'~-d~~.!,?+z with in some way, but Conforti discounts this. He thought it more likely that Camera fell asleep at the wheel after a heavy lunch. . ,.:! :(. ;c ,-,... 3;;~y~';';: In Italy, road accidents are the responsibility of the Polizia Stradale; ho&&r, iv8iefi'%c~den$i?$'-:?.itiii -:.:. :.$. . , occur in small towns such as Cassino, the local Carabinieri are also informed. In addition t&$r;i.'i.t.t:'~:::~: i ';. .(-~t.i:...;li;...;~:L.r~ . ?:. . . .-. . C . . . ,.:.; - . ..;.\ .,:\:;,: being told that a fatal accident had occurred, they were informed on ..... ijis , qccasion . .that a npmb~.$k@%i'~2:.:+:, :: :~F.I:. ..-:. . . :.: ... &. . T; s - I .
The Metropolitan's vase by the Greek artist Euphronios, now being returned to Italy, was probably looted from a tomb like this at Cerveteri, north of Rome. Medici's polaroids show him (below) and dealer Robert Hecht (bottom), who sold the vase to the Met, posing with it at the museum. of photographs had been found in the glove compartment of the car, showing archaeological objects. It so happened that the commander of the Carabinieri in Cassino at that time had himself been a member of the Art Squad. On being told about the contents of the glove compartment, he immediately telephoned his former colleagues. Conforti now saw his chance-an opportunity that might never come again. Within an hour his men had contacted a magistrate in Santa Maria di Capua Vetere and obtained a search warrant, which entitled them to raid and search Camera's apartment in Rome. The apartment, in a relatively new building, had a squareshaped sitting room, a large study leading off it, and a balcony running along the south side that looked down on streets crowded with students. The furniture was a little on the flamboyant side, with the decoration-wallpaper, curtains, lampshades-in pastel shades. Beyond that, however, the contents of the second-floor apartment were incredibly untidy-papers his apartment had been used "for years" as a "warehouse" were strewn all over, uneaten food was turning moldy, dirty for looted antiquities, many of them from Sicily. The objects laundry appeared to have been dropped anywhere. Eight men would be stored in his apartment, he said, for months or took part in the raid, and their first aim was to put order into longer, and then, acting on instructions, he would pack the the chaos. There were hundreds of photographs, Polaroids antiquities into boxes and mail them abroad from the post mainly, and pages and pages of documentation, together with office on the ground floor beneath his apartment. scores of antiquities, some of which were genuine but many The Carabinieri had in mind a second raid, on the grounds of which were obviously fake. The investigators spent a few that, as Conforti pointed out, having been raided once Zicchi hours that night sifting through the contents of the apartment would think he was safe. Before they could do so, however, and then sealed the door. Conforti received a phone call from an archaeologist at the A breakthrough as a result of the raid came via the Villa Giulia, Rome's Etruscan museum. This was Daniela names mentioned in the paperwork the Carabinieri con- Rizzo, an archaeologist at the museum who worked closely fiscated. These names led to no fewer than 70 other raids, with the Art Squad, verifying whether allegedly looted objects which unearthed hundreds of looted vases and other were genuine or not and, if genuine, from where they had objects-and to the arrest of 19 individuals, all of whom most probably been looted. This time, she was calling to say were found guilty at their subsequent trials. Among the that she had been contacted by an old woman who said that names was that of Danilo Zicchi. His apartment was raided her son had just inherited a collection of antiquities and was toward the end of September. anxious to have her-Rizzo-come and see them, authenti- Archaeology July/August 2001 , i :
Page 4: Hecht's name was underlined, and fr
Page 7 and 8: What interest did Hecht have in the

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