The blackened, cloth-wrapped hand arrived in a parcel at Los Angeles International Airport in January 2013. It was listed as a sci-fi movie prop, valued at $66. But as officials with U.S. Customs and Border Protection learned, the hand was from a real Egyptian mummy, nearly 3,000 years old.This is a perfect setup for a horror movie, so I imagine the people of Los Angeles will be happy for it to be sent home so that Egypt can keep an eye on it.
The hand was apparently voluntarily forfeited by the importer, and this week, U.S. authorities repatriated it and four other illegally smuggled artifacts to Egypt as part of an ongoing investigation known as "Operation Mummy's Curse."
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Sunday, December 11, 2016
Operation Mummy's Curse
WHAT COULD GO WRONG? Stolen Mummy Hand Makes Its Way Home (Meg Gannon, Live Science/Yahoo).