Washington grave robbers charged

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An Oregon couple was arraigned Aug. 11 in Benton County Superior Court on charges of disturbing an Indian burial ground along the Columbia River in southern Washington state. Authorities recovered more than 30,000 artifacts from the home of Irrigon, Oregon residents John Joseph Horner Jr., 48, and Leona J. Lightle, 42. A sheriff's department spokesman described the stockpile as a "better collection than most museums would have, outside of the Smithsonian."

Horner and Lightle pleaded not guilty at a preliminary hearing and told the judge that they would hire an attorney to represent them against the felony charges. After making their pleas, the couple quickly left the justice centre without responding to questions "Let's just say it got out of hand" was all Horner said as he left the court room.

"It's the largest (dig) we know of in Benton County, based on what we were able to recover," Lieutenant John Hodge said.

The Umatilla and Yakama tribes have claims on the disturbed land. The treaty of 1855, which created Indian reservations, ceded most Indian lands to the United States. The tribes retained certain rights, including that burial grounds in the ceded lands remain undisturbed. The location was not disclosed in order to protect the site from future digs by "pot hunters," as archeological looters are commonly termed.

Representatives of the tribes ? who assisted the investigation ? said they were outraged by the dig but said it's a problem that has plagued Indians since first contact.

"A very disgusting amount of artifacts has been removed from this site," said Jeff Van Plet, a cultural-resource protection specialist with the Umatilla Tribes' department of natural resources.

"It's just real sad that somebody would think they have the right to go out on public land and destroy resources that belong to everybody . . . and exploit it for their own personal gain."

After the hearing, Van Plet said the tribe was pleased with the effort of country law enforcement officials to protect Indian burial grounds.

The couple pleaded innocent in district court to misdemeanor charges June 23. Since then, prosecutors learned that the disturbed archeological site was a burial ground. Under state law, knowingly disturbing an archeological site is a misdemeanor, but disturbing a burial ground ? whether knowingly or not ? is a felony, deputy prosecutor John Jensen said. The felony charges carry maximum sentences of five years in prison and $10,000 fines. It's unknown how many of the artifacts seized were looted from the burial ground.

"We took this case very seriously," Jensen said. "This obviously was an operation where these people took a lot of time to collect these artifacts."

A neighbor of the burial ground tipped the sheriff's department to the illegal dig. The excavation may date back to 1991. Investigators served a search warrant on the couple's home April 28. The original misdemeanor charges were filed about a month later.

Among the pieces recovered were at least 500 well-reserved arrowheads and spearheads; hundreds of stone tools, including knives, scrapers and grinders; thousands of stone fragments and several beads.

The artifacts ? some of which date back to ancient times ? were stored in boxes, buckets and display cases primarily hidden in the home's basement, Hodge said. The seized pieces filled the bed of a three-quarter-ton pickup. Unearthing the artifacts probably involved the movement of several hundred square meters of dirt and destroyed the scientific value of the site, according to authorities.

It was the discovery of the beads, objects commonly contained in burial sites, that led an archeologist to classify the digging areas as a burial site. Although no human remains were discovered in the couple's home, a state witness will testify that the area is a burial site.

A representative of the land owner said efforts are being made to prevent future excavations: "We have been concerned about this for a numer of years. Our goal here is to do the right thing and restore the artifacts to the people they belong to."

The burial ground has been home to the Umatilla, Yakama and several other tribes for 13,000 years. In Benton County alone, there are some 1,200 known Indian archeological sites. There were numerous permanent villages in addition to hunting and fishing grounds in the region.

"It's a constant concern and has been going on for many, many years," said Lonnie Selam, a Yakama tribal councilman. "If it was reversed, if we had Indians disturbing the graves of early settlers, we would end up in prison."

The underground market for Indian artifacts is thriving despite efforts to crack down on pot hunters, said John Leier, district archeologist with the Army Corps of Engineers.

"There is definitely and has been for many years a real market for artifacts," Leier said. "The real loss is they're destroying a valuable resource that has a lot to offer to us in terms of getting some handle on what happened in the past."

The trial is set for Sept. 5.