The Dinosaur Artist

by Paige Williams

  “Want some help?” she said.

  “Yes,” he told her. “Because I have no idea what to do next.”

  Levin said, “Oh, I do.”

  Painter already had issued a press release praising Elbegdorj’s wisdom in fighting for the T. bataar, saying, “This is a victory not only for the people of Mongolia, who are one step closer to proving the true ownership of this important dinosaur, but also for the important friendship between the people of the United States and Mongolia.” Now he suggested that Elbegdorj formally write to Levin, asking the U.S. government to step in. The move might prompt the seller—whose name Robert Painter and the Mongolians still did not know—to give up the dinosaur. Elbegdorj responded immediately, requesting “legal action.”

  A summons soon arrived by fax at Heritage’s Park Avenue office in New York. Homeland Security Investigations, a division of the Department of Homeland Security, sought “any and all records relating to Lot 49315 ‘SUPERB TYRANNOSAURUS SKELETON,’” including the name and location of the “owner, seller, consignor, shipper, importer, exporter” and buyer. Heritage complied, sending federal investigators what few papers they had on file: a commercial invoice, a UPS Air waybill, a UPS Supply Chain Solutions invoice, and customs forms, which revealed the names Eric Prokopi and Christopher Moore.

  Eric had been in near constant contact with Heritage, but now Heritage and the Mongolians appeared increasingly aligned, issuing joint press releases announcing their cooperation in investigating the dinosaur’s path to market. They agreed that an international team of paleontologists would inspect the skeleton and formally confirm its species and, if possible, its origin.

  A couple of days into the negotiations, Heritage received a surprising email from someone named Don Lessem, who identified himself as “Steven Spielberg’s dinosaur advisor” and said he worked “closely with the Mongolian government.” Lessem was a former journalist from Philadelphia and a promoter of exhibits involving natural history and cultural artifacts. He had worked with the Mongolian government on a Genghis Khan exhibit at the Field Museum, coauthored a book with Jack Horner, and produced a Giganotosaurus cast for the Academy of Natural Sciences. Mongolia’s Ministry of Culture had now asked him “unofficially” if he might resolve the T. bataar situation quietly, he told Heritage, saying the whole matter “reflected badly” on all: “Chris Moore is viewed as a commercializer of stolen goods, and has already felt harassed by Homeland Security; Heritage is viewed as knowingly dealing in objects of highly questionable provenance; the Mongolian government is seen as lax in protecting its cultural heritage.” With luck, they could put the situation to rest “without court appearances or negative press attention.” Lessem felt certain that the Mongolians considered Heritage’s decision to pause the bataar transaction a “great service to the nation” and said company officials would probably be invited to Ulaanbaatar to “receive an award from the President.” That “same possibility of honor and award” might be extended to Chris Moore if Heritage cooperated. Lessem didn’t know Moore, but liked him; he didn’t know Eric Prokopi, either, but considered him foolhardy and arrogant.

  Then he made a suggestion: perhaps Mongolia could reimburse Moore for the no doubt staggering expenses involved in shipping and prepping the T. bataar. In Lessem’s scenario, the Mongolian government would pay Moore $150,000. Heritage would be seen as having killed the sale once questions of scientific integrity were raised, and Mongolia would receive a nice skeleton to display at its natural history museum. “The alternative—further questioning by the press, and legal wrangling—is far more distasteful to all involved,” Lessem told Heritage. If the plan worked, “Heritage gets off the hook for selling a controversial specimen, and the Mongolian government can say it came to the rescue,” he added. “There’s a LOT of politics involved in this of course. Yucky business, huh?”

  Eric did not appreciate the idea of being cut out of such a deal. If anyone deserved the $150,000 it was he. He had worked around the clock prepping the skeleton. He had seen it to market. He tried to get a piece of the proposal, telling Heritage, “Although I am sure that everything with this specimen is legal as far back as I can tell, I do know just about all of the people involved in the business of [Central Asian] fossils, and could offer ideas and help to make permanent changes that would nearly eliminate the black market and benefit all sides. If the Mongolian president is indeed only interested in getting to the bottom of the sources and wants to look good for his people, I think I can help him do that if he is willing to cooperate and compromise. If he only wants to take the skeleton and try to put an end to the black market, he will have a fight and will only drive the black market deeper underground.”

  Eric’s response reflected the opportunistic aspect of the murkier realms of the fossil trade. The black market was a myth; the black market was real. Permits existed; permits probably didn’t exist. Eric wasn’t saying he ran a black market business in Mongolian dinosaurs, but the aggressive email sure made it look like he did.

  Robert Painter decided he wanted nothing to do with Don Lessem’s proposal. In his opinion, everything needed to go through President Elbegdorj’s office rather than involve outsiders or even Mongolian ministry officials. The opportunity for a payoff deal vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared.

  Now that the temporary restraining order was active, the skeleton was locked up at a warehouse in Sunnyside, Queens, belonging to Cadogan Tate, a fine-arts storage company. Heritage was still waiting for Eric to provide the papers he claimed to have, proving that he and Moore had had permission to export the T. bataar in the first place. “We do have documents,” Eric blustered to Jim Halperin, the Heritage CEO. “But obviously it depends on how much the Mongolians are willing to work with us as to whether we are willing to provide all the info they may want.”

  With uncharacteristic somberness, Halperin told him, “That would be a very foolish position to take, IMO.”

  The dinosaur inspection was scheduled for June 5 at the warehouse in Queens. When Eric insisted on uncrating the dinosaur himself, the government of Mongolia agreed to cover his travel expenses to New York and asked, through Heritage, where he wanted to stay. Eric said the Shelburne, where he and Amanda had stayed when they sold the “Nic Cage skull.” The hotel had no rooms available, and Eric ultimately wound up at a La Quinta Inn in Queens. He woke up there on the morning of the inspection and walked over to the warehouse before the paleontologists arrived. Piece by piece, he laid out the T. bataar on long tables, leaving the larger bones in their crates, nestled in padding and Bubble Wrap. Then he returned to the hotel and waited, staying in touch with a Heritage employee by text.

  The inspection team consisted of Tsogtbaatar, the Mongolian paleontologist who ran the national paleontological center under the Mongolian Academy of Sciences and one of the scientists named in the 1993 GEO article about commercial fossil-hunting in Mongolia; Philip Currie, the tyrannosaur expert from Canada; and Bolor Minjin. Mark Norell couldn’t make it, but agreed to coauthor a report with Currie—collectively the two scientists had logged forty field seasons in the Gobi. The other members of the delegation were President Elbegdorj’s chief of staff, P. Tsagaan, an exceedingly discreet former government minister, and B. Naranzun of the Mongolian Ministry of Education, Culture, and Science.

  The team arrived to find the crates and tables filled with femurs as fat as clubs, vertebrae the size of carburetors, ribs curved like a display of unstrung bows. Fossil by fossil, the paleontologists studied the coloring and made measurements. Noting the anatomical features—the disproportionately small forelimbs, the number of tooth sockets, the domed shape of an eye bone, the narrow skull—they agreed the dinosaur was Tarbosaurus bataar. Which meant the dinosaur was Mongolian. Because except for isolated scraps found in Kazakhstan and China, significant specimens of T. bataar, especially largely complete skeletons, had been collected only in or around the Nemegt Basin of Mongolia. The “fairly light” coloring with “ivory staining” match
ed the other fossils from that part of the Gobi. The scientists suspected the skeleton had been constructed with parts from different specimens, though it was hard to know for sure. They knew this, though: the skeleton was so nicely prepared, the work had been done abroad.

  The paleontologists’ reports were forwarded to the U.S. attorney’s office. On June 19, Sharon Levin filed a new asset forfeiture case, United States of America v. One Tyrannosaurus Bataar Skeleton. The complaint publicly named Eric Prokopi and alleged that the dinosaur had been smuggled from Mongolia into the United States via “several misstatements” on customs documents. To have listed Great Britain as the country of origin surely signaled intent to avoid mentioning Mongolia. The listed value of $15,000 clearly conflicted with Heritage’s estimate and subsequent million-dollar sale price. The contents’ description—“2 large rough (unprepared) fossil reptile heads” and so on—was surely an attempt to circumvent calling the fossils what they were: the remains of a Cretaceous dinosaur.

  An arrest warrant was issued for the T. bataar. Federal agents backed up a truck to the Queens warehouse, loaded the crates, and took them to a government storage facility. Eric soon received a letter from Levin, notifying him that he had thirty-five days to either surrender the dinosaur or legally claim it in court.

  Eric had been relying on Heritage’s attorneys—“You couldn’t be in better hands, in my opinion,” David Herskowitz told him—but now it seemed clear that he should hire his own legal representation. Eric had never needed a lawyer in his life and didn’t know the first thing about finding one, especially one who specialized in natural history. As he thought about what to do, a lawyer named Peter Tompa from the firm of Bailey & Ehrenberg, in Washington, DC, reached out to him.

  Tompa handled contracts and employment cases but also matters involving antiquities and cultural artifacts. For this case he partnered with Michael McCullough, a New York lawyer who had worked as vice president for compliance at Sotheby’s, specializing in U.S. customs law and international trade. Neither McCullough nor Tompa had handled a case involving a dinosaur, but the niche opportunity seemed to be presenting itself now that fine-arts auction houses sold fossils. The partners would represent Eric pro bono and, if successful, take a cut of the dinosaur sale on the back end. They told their new client that they intended to fight the forfeiture while pushing for a settlement, hoping a “white knight” would buy the skeleton and donate it to Mongolia.

  Eric now staked an official claim to the T. bataar, saying he’d spent a year of his life and “considerable expense identifying, restoring, mounting, and preparing it” for auction. He instructed Heritage to release any and all relevant documents to the government. Chris Moore lawyered up, too: he cooperated with investigators and his name was barely mentioned again.

  The Heritage brand also faded from the story. On the long July 4 holiday, Greg Rohan, the company president, went on vacation to the Hamptons. One afternoon he stopped to reflect on the auction, saying Heritage would now have to rethink its natural history category. What a shame! People loved natural history! His wife, for instance, had once seen a river stone inlaid with fossil fish at auction: “In her mind she goes, ‘We could have the corners polished and put a piece of glass over the top and make a base, and it would be a perfect table.’ And then she sees some ammonites that are just sitting there and she goes, ‘Oh my God, you could… make a lamp.’ Well, now we have ammonite lamps in our guest bedroom!” Rohan was fifty-one and a lean six feet one. In khakis, a navy Izod, blue leather loafers, and a canvas belt embroidered with sailboats, he appeared ready to tack. “If you’ve got a large space for a dinosaur skeleton—I’ll tell ya,” he said, then shook his head. “The successful bidder for the Tarbosaurus”—he pronounced it Ta-bor-a-saurus—“he was gonna display it in a public building that he owns. Then all this hoopla happened, so.” Rohan was still trying to process what had happened. “The person who consigned it is not a novice—he’s been a paleontologist for decades. There’s a thriving trade in black market things that have nefarious pasts and origins and title issues, but I would certainly think that if he thought there were any title issues the last thing he would do is consign it to a major auction in New York City that was advertised worldwide.”

  If the T. bataar sale had gone through, the Heritage auction altogether would have yielded $1.7 million—nowhere near a dominant chunk of the company’s overall business, but also nothing to snub. “Had there not been a lawsuit filed right before the auction, there would’ve been many more buyers and it would’ve brought a much, much higher price,” Rohan said. That was his big regret. That and the lost commission and the legal expenses. “But that’s the cost of doing business,” he said, adding, obliviously, “I don’t think that anybody thought Heritage did anything wrong.”

  Anyway, he said, “We’re out.”

  And so they were.

  Eric had not uttered a word in the press, but now that his name was public and he was fighting the forfeiture, he issued a statement. He admitted to acquiring the dinosaur without knowing “for sure” where it came from. He said he had bought the skeleton from someone in Japan and sold it to Moore, then took it back after his partner ran out of time to prep it; the Japan bit was thrown in partly to scare the hell out of Hollis Butts. Commercial dealers and private collectors were a “vital part of bringing some of nature’s most precious treasures to museums worldwide,” he went on. “The commercial paleontology business is full of intelligent, passionate people who love paleontology, not bone smugglers just looking to steal from important scientific research. If it weren’t for people like me, some of these bones would just turn to dust and none of us would ever get to see or study them.”

  The case threatened to destroy him, he went on. “Imagine watching your house burn down with everything you have in it and knowing you have no insurance.” Later, in court, he would also argue that “fossil collecting is well established, and has been intertwined with paleontology in the United States at least since Thomas Jefferson converted the entry room of his home at Monticello into a natural history museum,” and that for years, fossils from China, Mongolia, Russia, and Kazakhstan had been “openly sold on the international markets.”

  The case went before U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel on September 7. Castel had heard matters involving mobsters (John Gotti Jr.) and rappers (Kanye West), but never a party from the late Cretaceous. “I stand to be educated,” he told the courtroom. “I’m not going to claim that I have dinosaur arrests presented to me with any frequency.”

  Eric skipped the hearing because its sole purpose was to determine whether the case would go to trial. Also, he had no desire to meet the press. For the moment he let his one public statement stand: “I’m just a guy… trying to support my family, not some international bone smuggler like I have been portrayed by some.”

  The judge wanted to know who Eric Prokopi was. The name was always a bit of a tongue tripper. It was not Pro-COPE-y or Pro-SKOP-y or Pro-COPES-y or Ko-PROSK-y. It was Pro-COPY. Prokopi. He never corrected anyone.

  “He collects fossils and builds dinosaurs out of them,” McCullough, one of his lawyers, told the judge.

  “How did he acquire it?” Judge Castel asked.

  “He purchased it.”

  “Where did he purchase it?”

  “Multiple sources.”

  “What sources?”

  “From dealers who sell dinosaur parts.”

  Learning that the skeleton had been assembled from the bones of more than one dinosaur, the judge said, “You’re telling me that what was being auctioned did not come from one once-upon-a-time living creature?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying,” McCullough said. Most of the skeleton was real bone; half of that was from one specimen; Eric had filled in the rest with matching bones from his inventory, casts bought from the Black Hills Institute, and other bits sculpted to match. Suddenly, and somewhat misleadingly, the T. bataar was being called a “Frankenstein” dinosaur, even t
hough museums are known to construct display skeletons with parts from different animals of the same or even different species.

  The judge turned to whether prosecutors could prove that the skeleton was even Mongolian. Wasn’t it possible that bataar lived elsewhere on Earth? Five esteemed paleontologists had provided letters to the court saying the answer was no—the fossils in question almost certainly had come from Mongolia.

  Judge Castel appeared unconvinced, but he moved on. “Any idea how large this dinosaur is, when fully assembled?” he asked at one point.

  About 24 feet long and 8 feet high, said Martin Bell, the assistant U.S. attorney handling the case.

  The judge said, “So it would fit nicely in my courtroom.”

  CHAPTER 18

  RAID!

  WALK AWAY, FRIENDS TOLD ERIC. SURRENDER THE DINOSAUR, get out, start over. Others wanted him to fight. Unable to tolerate the idea of losing so much money or of giving in, he decided to fight.

  Their income stalled, the Prokopis started offloading belongings. The Florida Fossils eBay account came alive with available merchandise: a fuel tank, a forklift crane, the gooseneck Continental Cargo race car trailer, an E-Z-Go golf cart. The Ford F550 pickup sold for $30,000, but it wasn’t enough. Their mortgage holders were poised to foreclose on Serenola because the house note had gone unpaid since December.

  At night, there wasn’t a crevice of the internet that Eric failed to Google to gauge the depth of public venom being leveled at him. “Grave robber,” “greedy slimeball,” and “destroyer of science” were only some of the names strangers called him. A few suggested that he die or “ROT IN HELL.” To Amanda, the whole thing was baffling. “It’s not like we murdered someone!” she kept saying. “People might think we were living this luxurious, wealthy life, but we made that life for ourselves. We didn’t have a Ford550 with a fifteen-hundred-dollar payment every month because we wanted to show off; we had to pull a heavy trailer. I like nice things but I’d rather eat off the appetizers list because it’s cheaper. We’re not crazy throw-money-in-the-air people. We had a few luxuries, sure—like taking my friends to the Bahamas. What are you working toward if you don’t eventually enjoy what you have? A lot of the successful people we know come from family money or family businesses. I was always proud of Eric that he hadn’t; he came from nothing, and he was scrappy and surviving. When he wanted a car, when he wanted to go to college, he had to do it on his own. It was like a dream come true, to be able to turn what you love into a real life. It was never our goal to get rich. When I met Eric, he was doing well but he wasn’t killing it. We killed it together.”