Feds Investigate Hobby Lobby Boss for Illicit Artifacts

[josephpalazzo]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/10/26/exclusive-feds-investigate-hobby-lobby-boss-for-illicit-artifacts.html

One of America’s most famously Christian businesses is amassing a vast collection of Biblical antiquities. The problem is some of them may have been looted from the Middle East.


In 2011, a shipment of somewhere between 200 to 300 small clay tablets on their way to Oklahoma City from Israel was seized by U.S. Customs agents in Memphis. The tablets were inscribed in cuneiformâ€"the script of ancient Assyria and Babylonia, present-day Iraqâ€"and were thousands of years old. Their destination was the compound of the Hobby Lobby corporation, which became famous last year for winning a landmark Supreme Court case on religious freedom and government mandates. A senior law enforcement source with extensive knowledge of antiquities smuggling confirmed that these ancient artifacts had been purchased and were being imported by the deeply-religious owners of the crafting giant, the Green family of Oklahoma City. For the last four years, law enforcement sources tell The Daily Beast, the Greens have been under federal investigation for the illicit importation of cultural heritage from Iraq.

These tablets, like the other 40,000 or so ancient artifacts owned by the Green family, were destined for the Museum of the Bible, the giant new museum funded by the Greens, slated to open in Washington, D.C., in 2017. Both the seizure of the cuneiform tablets and the subsequent federal investigation were confirmed to us by Cary Summers, the president of the Museum of the Bible.

From its founding in 1970, the Greens’ Hobby Lobby chain has been more than simply a suite of craft stores. The Greens have used it as a model of a business run on Christian values. Stores are closed on Sundays in order to give employees time to attend church. The company employs four chaplains, and offered a free health clinic to staff at its headquarters long before free health care came into political vogue. The Greens have also used the Hobby Lobby platform to spread their Christian message far and wide: The company annually places full-page ads celebratingâ€"in their wordsâ€" “the real meaning of Christmas, Easter, and Independence Day” in newspapers across the country.

Bazinga

[SGOS]

Smuggling for Jesus!  Nothin' wrong with that because, well, it's for Jesus.  But praise the Supreme Court for upholding the law in our behalf, while we break the law for our convenience.

[stromboli]

Jesus justifies everything. Ask Kim Davis.

[jonb]

Who is the main group destroying and selling ancient artefacts in Iraq?

Religious fanatics are all of one group.

[TomFoolery]

I just finished watching The Rape of Europa on Netflix: it's about art, monuments, and antiquities seized or destroyed by the Nazis. It says a lot about humanity that we're capable of producing great pieces of art, appreciating them, and murdering the shit out of people to appreciate those things privately or say we "own" them.

Besides, it's fun to draw parallels between David Green and Hermann Göring. Anyone who would capitalize on war as a way of robbing a country or citizens of cultural treasures doesn't get to act pious.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

Can anyone else smell the out of court settlement and fine along with all of the proceedings being sealed so that the public remains completely ignorant of the going ons of America's best Christians?   

[Baruch]

Stolen works of art, are a major item of trade in organized crime circles.  This is a way of barter for those not wanting to launder large amounts of money.  I wonder if Hobby Lobby knows ... Guido or Dominic?

[trdsf]

Wonder how many of them were looted from the museum in Baghdad when Dumbass made sure that the oil papers were protected, but the cultural heritage of the entire region for the last several thousand years were left to fend for themselves...

[aitm]

Didn't read it all, but to be honest, there is a group over there going around destroying any antiquities so I think the argument may be put forth that they are "saving" the artifacts for the future of humanity. Ta-da!

[TomFoolery]

Didn't read it all, but to be honest, there is a group over there going around destroying any antiquities so I think the argument may be put forth that they are "saving" the artifacts for the future of humanity. Ta-da!

Yes, and when museums emptied their collections and turned them over to private citizens to prevent the Nazis from stealing or destroying them, most of those citizens gave them back after the war was over. Somehow I doubt David Green has simply "temporary safekeeping" on his mind.

[jonb]

Time line

ISIS not not start destroying ancient sites until the BBC among others started talking about the trade in antiquities being used to finance ISIS, Thus now, western buyers can now justify buying antiquities because they are saving them. And ISIS have secured the trade and their finances.

Religion in this area is the same as anywhere else, it is just an excuse used by those with power to retain power.