FROM:
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE67J0PN20100820

Gold bullion stolen from Florida treasure museum

MIAMI FLORIDA
Thu Aug 19, 2010 11:47pm EDT

MIAMI (Reuters) - Thieves stole a $550,000 gold bar
from a treasure museum where it went on display after
a Florida salvager recovered it from the wreck of a
Spanish galleon that lay on the ocean floor for
centuries, the museum's executive director said.

The 74.85-ounce gold bar was stolen on Wednesday from
the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum in Key West, Florida,
in what executive director Melissa Kendrick called
"a very quiet smash and grab."

The 11-inch (28-centimeter) gold bar was inside a
glass case with a small opening where visitors could
stick a hand inside and lift the bar to examine it.

Footage from the museum's security camera clearly
showed two culprits who made off with it, and the
FBI and local police were investigating. The museum's
insurer offered a $10,000 reward for its safe return,
Kendrick said on Thursday.

Gold has hovered near historic highs after hitting a
record $1,266.50 an ounce in June, but the stolen
bar's $550,000 valuation reflects historic value far
beyond its melt-down worth.

Mel Fisher, a Key West treasure hunter who died in
1998, recovered the bar in 1980 from the wreck of the
Santa Margarita, a Spanish galleon that sank off the
Florida Keys during a hurricane in 1622.

Kendall said the bar had several distinctive markings,
including Roman numerals signifying it was 16-karat
gold, a symbol identifying its owner, and a series
of dots indicating what taxes the owner had paid to
the Spanish crown.

"It's a one-of-a-kind piece," Kendall said.

The theft was the talk of Key West, an island town
of 25,000 people at the southern tip of the Florida
Keys.

Fisher and his crew found the wreck of the Santa
Margarita while searching for its sister ship, the
Nuestra Senora de Atocha.

The ships were part of a flotilla carrying gold,
silver, emeralds and pearls from the colonial New
World back to Spain.

Fisher and his crew found the Atocha's motherlode in
1985, hauling up one of the world's greatest sunken
treasures of gold, silver bars and coins, as well as
jewelry, gems and housewares owned by the sailors,
soldiers, noblemen and clergy who perished when the
ship sank.

(Reporting by Jane Sutton, editing by Vicki Allen)



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