A Tempest in a Teapot, or the Symbolic Function of Criminal Trials

The Symbolic Function

Marion True, the former Getty curator, was charged for conspiracy in violation of the cultural patrimony laws for allegedly helping a Sicilian antiquities smuggling ring whose goal was to loot, excavate, and export the Aphrodite statute out of Italy. This paper argues that the Italian government has supplemented the purpose of fact finding in criminal trials by transforming True's trial into a symbol of a cultural crusade against illegally exported antiquities for two reasons. First, True's trial functions as an iconic message to cultural institutions that the Italian government is shifting the emphasis of anti-smuggling enforcement from the Mafioso looters in Sicily to American museum professionals. Second, it serves to hurry American museums to repatriate the suspicious antiquities in their collections. True's trial represents a historical culmination of two social forces: Italy's unsuccessful enforcement efforts at home and a resurging nationalist fervor to reclaim Italy's patrimony illegally abroad.

Shifting the Burden from Italian Criminals…

...in the Black Market...

The Italian government’s shift in emphasis from prosecuting local looters to foreign museum professionals originates in a surprising technological development, the portable metal detector. Cheap and accessible, these devices proliferated in Sicily in the 1970s and allowed local smuggling rings to interfere with the well-financed archaeological digs conducted by professional teams. Sicily constitutes a Mafia-controlled enclave commanded by the lawlessness of bribery and corruption. With new potential revenue from these million dollar statues, the Mafia is believed to have contributed to the illicit lootings with the help of these cheaper technologies. Orazio di Simone, True’s alleged co-conspirator, has been repeatedly accused of having ties to the Mafia.

…to Foreign Museum Professionals

True’s trial signifies Italy’s failure to successfully prosecute the looters, smuggling rings, and general Mafioso lawlessness. As a Sicilian dilettante of archaeology, Judge Magistrate Raffiotta led the crusade in the unsuccessful prosecutions against the looters in the 1980s. The problem of prosecuting these actors is simple: When the looter operates in unpeopled areas of Sicily during the darkness of night and with few traces, efforts to capture him and prove his guilt are stifled, especially with the Sicilian habit of concealment and corruption. Of the 36 trials presided by Rafiotta, very few turned up a conviction, owing to the lack of evidence. In the late 1980s, Rafiotta moved the Italian cordon sanitaire from around the locals to the foreign buyers on the antiquity market to suffocate the trade.

This trial emblematizes Italy’s shift to discrediting the antiquity buyers after fifty years of non-enforcement beyond the Italian frontier. The night looter hands it to the smuggler, who passes Italian customs and gives it to the dealer in Switzerland, who sells it to an American buyer, who clears it with American customs. Far from the smuggling of the artifacts, the foreign buyer bears the legal impact of enforcing cultural patrimony laws in Italy. As the only one prosecuting the buyer, True’s trial masquerades under the promise of her factual guilt its other purpose of dispiriting looters and enforcing Italian laws at home. An American has transformed into utilitarian food for Italian legal enforcement.

A Martyr for Another Country's Cause

Powerful Symbol for Repatriation

True’s trial signifies a radical diplomatic effort to bring antiquities home. By ineffectively enforcing the laws at home for decades, Italy was drained of many ancient works. While Italy pursued these antiquities since 1988 in Mediterranean languor, True’s indictment in 2006 has shown, faute de mieux, more success. Since then, at least four cultural institutions in America hurriedly agreed to return allegedly looted antiquities, some returning more than the blemished.

Italy’s successful efforts to get publicity for a criminal trial against an American corrupt its legitimacy. Less than a disinterested state prosecuting a foreigner, Italy has embroiled True in an issue of nationalist politics. The government has summarily spoken of her ‘obvious guilt’ without having tried her or offering proof. If fact finding were the only purpose, the Italian government would have indicted far more museum directors to discover the extent of their involvement in the underworld, a possibility as likely as hers. Symbolism mystifies our perception of the ‘real world’ to empower what is otherwise powerless. Its main purpose is to turn the content-free case of True’s trial, whose facts we read little in the newspaper, into a powerfully symbolic cause célèbre inspiring a new alacrity among museums to negotiate with the Italian government.

A War Offensive

True’s trial is a counteroffensive against American cultural ‘invasions’ despite the paradox that Italians illegally smuggle the antiquities. Warlike language is befitting where the Italian government threatened to order a ‘cultural embargo’ against the Getty when it remained hesitant to negotiate even after the indictment. The Italian government understood Robert Olson’s invitation to the American ambassador as a witness to the negotiations to represent a form of political pressure over an issue it regards as cultural, fit for cultural ministers. This misbelief belies two problems. First, Italy knows that charging an American with a crime represents a diplomatic sticky wicket for the political executive branch in the US. Second, the Italian government confessedly discontinued negotiations with the Getty at the brink of resolution because the political environment in Italy precluded agreement without a specific statue included. True’s trial represents a political tool in achieving vittoria against the museum outlaws. Indeed, the government recently declared this achievement in an exhibition entitled Nostoi, Greek for homecoming.

A Modern Show Trial?

The Soviet show trials under Stalin define the word itself in our modern lexicon. The Bolshevik state, including the Trotskyites, perceived these trials as progress in the march of history. They functioned less as a factual inquiry than as a historical event to solidify the death and resurrection of the collectivist soul of communist Russia. To a far lesser degree, True’s trial also represents a historical event to achieve the goal of repatriation after domestic failures to contain the cultural items. Whether True is innocent or guilty, Italy is successfully fulfilling its destiny. (995 words)

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