A German civil court in Munich on Friday sentenced Leonardo Patterson, a Costa Rican art dealer living in Germany, to three years probation for “deceptively selling a piece of recent manufacture as an archaeological artifact of Mexican origin to a German citizen.”
Laidy Bonilla, an archeologist with the National Museum’s Department of Cultural Heritage Protection and who was involved in the raid, told The Tico Times the collection is very large, making up more than half of the 148 artifacts seized so far in 2014. The collection included ceremonial and domestic items such as ceramic vases, pendants, metates — mealing stones used to grind corn and seeds — mortars, and grinding stones from Costa Rica’s Pacific northwest dated between 300 AD and 700 AD.
Culture Minister Elizabeth Fonseca on Monday rejected another request by the Legislative Assembly's directorate to approve building permits for a new Assembly complex in downtown San José, at the legislature's current location.
At 2 p.m. on Tuesday Costa Rica's Culture Ministry issued a press release confirming they will not approve construction permits for a new complex that would have housed the Legislative Assembly in downtown San José.
