gollum said:
Roy and Springfield,
I highly doubt the FBI Agent's statement to Corbin was just the result of the FBI pulling a date out of their as$es. Remember, the result of the FBIs Opinion was that the AZ Court forced MOEL to donate the Stone maps to a Non-Profit (AL Flagg/AM&MM). If their opinion was based on nothing but "anal conjecture" (pulling a date out of their as$), that would have left the court's decision to be overturned and the FBI to be sued in a Civil Court. In this action, the Court forced the owners of what had been private property for twenty years to GIVE/DONATE the stones. Mitchel/MOEL did not donate them as part of any tax deal as was previously thought.
If your OPINION is going to be the cause of someone losing their private property that they consider to be VERY valuable, you had better have your ducks in a row, and a VERY GOOD basis for forming your OPINION!
Best-Mike
I find the FBI's involvement curious from the start. As I read the land status maps covering the alleged 'discovery point' for the stones, it seems to be either on State Land (most probable) or on private land (less probable). In either case, the
Feds did not have jurisdiction based on the
Antiquities Act of 1906 , which specifies that possible archaeological/historical sites lying on
Federal Land shall be controlled by the head of the appropriate Federal Agency (FS, NPS, BLM, et al). Since the
Arizona Antiquities Act of 1960 post-dates the alleged 1949 discovery of the stones, it seems to me that if the Tumlinson story is accurate (big
if), the 'artifacts' were the legal possession of their owners and were not subject to antiquities legislation of any kind. Of course, you can see thousands of examples of this sort of situation - just drive into any old rancher's property and check out the numerous manos, metates, stone tools, pottery, etc. in his possession. All legal if he can demonstrate where and when they were recovered.
Bottom line: the cops may have hard-balled Mitchell in the court proceedings, but it sounds like they were blowing smoke. This makes the 'FBI opinion' even more suspect to me. These stones may well be 'old', but isn't it time to lay the 'FBI opinion' to rest as 'proof'?
Of course, as Jim said above,
"It does not really matter to me who found them, where they were found, or who lied, and who told the truth. My main interest lies in the information that is inscribed on them, and how to use it."