Antiquities Expert Charged With Trafficking in Cambodian Artifacts

via New York Times, 27 November 2019: Antiquities dealer Douglas Latchford has been indicted by the US government for smuggling looted Cambodian antiquities and falsifying documents for their later sale. Latchford had earlier been identified for his role in the looted guardian statues from Koh Ker (see here and here), which were returned to Cambodia over the last few years.

Investigators have charged Douglas A. J. Latchford, a leading expert on Khmer antiquities, with smuggling looted Cambodian relics and helping to sell them on the international art market by concealing their tainted histories with falsified documentation.

In a federal indictment unsealed on Wednesday, Mr. Latchford, 88, was accused of having served for decades as a “conduit” for Cambodian antiquities that had been excavated illegally from ancient jungle temples during unrest in the country starting in the mid-1960s, with the beginnings of the Cambodian civil war.

According to a news release from the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, Mr. Latchford, a dual citizen of Thailand and the United Kingdom, falsified invoices and shipping documents to make it easier to sell those looted artifacts to major auction houses, dealers and museums.

Source: Antiquities Expert Charged With Trafficking in Cambodian Artifacts