Amid intense media coverage, early in the morning of January 23, 2008, federal agents served search warrants on four southern California museums: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Pacific Asia Museum, Charles W. Bowers Museum, and Mingei International Museum. Two warrants allege, inter alia, that the Bowers and Pacific Asia museums possess stolen antiquities from Thailand in violation of the National Stolen Property Act (NSPA).3 The NSPA criminalizes the possession of property valued at $5,000 or more that crossed a federal or state border after the property was stolen if the possessor knows the property to be stolen.
