(U.S. Department of Justice)The arts-and-crafts retailer Hobby Lobby has agreed to pay a $3 million fine for illegally importing thousands of ancient clay artifacts smuggled into the United States from Iraq, federal prosecutors said Wednesday. “We should have exercised more oversight and carefully questioned how the acquisitions were handled,” Hobby Lobby President Steve Green said in the statement. According to the complaint, Hobby Lobby began collecting a range of historically significant manuscripts and other antiquities in 2009. They later sent Hobby Lobby a provenance statement — a guarantee of authenticity — indicating that the artifacts were legally acquired in the 1960s from local markets. Hobby Lobby proceeded with the sale.

Source: Washington Post July 06, 2017 02:38 UTC