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HomeCultureHistoric PreservationMan indicted for pillaging Native American site in Missouri

Man indicted for pillaging Native American site in Missouri

Osage Nation archeologist told prosecutors that the conspiracy greatly impacts the cultural history of the Osage Nation and related tribes

A 70-year-old man has been indicted on 11 criminal counts related to the pillaging of Native American artifacts on federal land known as the Tightwad Site at Harry S. Truman Lake in Missouri.

Johnny Lee Brown of Clinton, Mo., is accused of digging up pottery, weapons, projectiles, tools and other items, causing more than $300,000 in damages, a value determined by an Osage Nation archeologist, who told prosecutors that the conspiracy greatly impacts the cultural history of the Osage Nation and related tribes.

According to an indictment unsealed June 12 in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, Brown and other co-conspirators “known and unknown” to investigators used trowels and shovels to remove artifacts and deface property starting in June 2016 and continuing through April of 2020. They also used a metal detector on at least one occasion, according to the indictment.

The Tightwad Site is located high on a peninsula on Truman Lake. It was a campsite and/or stone-processing site dating back 3,000 to 5,000 years and the artifacts are densely concentrated from the surface to about 15 inches deep.

The indictment specifies the exact dates and times during which the site was plundered and the value of what was taken during each visit to the site.

Brown is charged with one count of conspiracy, four counts of excavating and defacing archeological resources, and four counts of depredation of government property. The maximum cumulative sentence he faces would be 17 years, although federal sentencing guidelines based on his cooperation, past record and other factors will ultimately decide that should he be found guilty.

A review of Missouri court records shows that Brown has been cited for such infractions as littering but no serious crimes.

He was assigned a federal public defender on the day the indictment was unsealed. The grand jury issued the indictment on April 26 but it was kept secret until Brown was arrested.

Author

  • Louise Red Corn

    Title: Freelance Author
    Twitter: @louiseredcorn
    Languages: English, Italian, rusty but revivable Russian

    Louise Red Corn has been a news reporter for 34 years and a photographer for even longer. She grew up in Northern California, the youngest child of two lawyers, her father a Pearl Harbor survivor who later became a state judge and her mother a San Francisco native who taught law at the University of California at Davis.

    After graduating from the U.C. Berkley with a degree in Slavic Languages and Literatures with no small amount of coursework in Microbiology, she moved to Rome, Italy, where she worked as a photographer and wordsmith for the United Nation’s International Fund for Agricultural Development, specializing in the French-speaking countries of Africa.

    When the radioactive cloud from Chernobyl parked over Rome in 1986, she escaped to New York City to work for the international editions of Time Magazine. She left Time for Knight-Ridder newspapers in Biloxi, Miss., Detroit and Lexington, Ky., During nearly 20 years with Knight-Ridder, she was a stringer (freelancer) for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and Parade Magazine.

    In 2004, she married Raymond Red Corn and moved to Oklahoma, where she worked for the Tulsa World before she bought the weekly newspaper in Barnsdall and turned a tired newspaper into the award-winning Bigheart Times, which she sold in 2018. She hired on at the Osage News in early 2022.

    Throughout her career she has won dozens of state, national and international journalism awards.

    Red Corn is comfortable reporting on nearly any topic, the more complex the better, but her first love is covering courts and legal issues. Her proudest accomplishment was helping to exonerate a Tennessee man facing the death penalty after he was wrongfully charged with capital murder in Kentucky, a state he had never visited.

Louise Red Corn
Louise Red Cornhttps://osagenews.org
Title: Freelance Author
Twitter: @louiseredcorn
Languages: English, Italian, rusty but revivable Russian

Louise Red Corn has been a news reporter for 34 years and a photographer for even longer. She grew up in Northern California, the youngest child of two lawyers, her father a Pearl Harbor survivor who later became a state judge and her mother a San Francisco native who taught law at the University of California at Davis.

After graduating from the U.C. Berkley with a degree in Slavic Languages and Literatures with no small amount of coursework in Microbiology, she moved to Rome, Italy, where she worked as a photographer and wordsmith for the United Nation’s International Fund for Agricultural Development, specializing in the French-speaking countries of Africa.

When the radioactive cloud from Chernobyl parked over Rome in 1986, she escaped to New York City to work for the international editions of Time Magazine. She left Time for Knight-Ridder newspapers in Biloxi, Miss., Detroit and Lexington, Ky., During nearly 20 years with Knight-Ridder, she was a stringer (freelancer) for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and Parade Magazine.

In 2004, she married Raymond Red Corn and moved to Oklahoma, where she worked for the Tulsa World before she bought the weekly newspaper in Barnsdall and turned a tired newspaper into the award-winning Bigheart Times, which she sold in 2018. She hired on at the Osage News in early 2022.

Throughout her career she has won dozens of state, national and international journalism awards.

Red Corn is comfortable reporting on nearly any topic, the more complex the better, but her first love is covering courts and legal issues. Her proudest accomplishment was helping to exonerate a Tennessee man facing the death penalty after he was wrongfully charged with capital murder in Kentucky, a state he had never visited.

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