Spain Files Suit To Claim Sunken Treasure

Florida Deep-Sea Exploration Crew Found Estimated $500 Million, 19th-Century Booty

(AP)  Spain laid formal claim Thursday to a shipwreck that yielded an estimated $500 million in treasure, saying it has proof the vessel is Spanish and demanding that a Florida deep-sea exploration firm that recovered the booty give it all back.

Culture Ministry officials and James Goold, a Washington-based lawyer who represents the Spanish government, said the 19th-century shipwreck at the heart of a year-old dispute with Odyssey Marine Exploration of Tampa is without a doubt the Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes. The Spanish warship was sunk by the British navy southwest of Portugal in 1804 with more than 200 people on board.

"We are talking about the remains of a Spanish navy vessel, and the human remains of Spanish naval servicemen who died on board which have been illegally disturbed," said ministry director general Jose Jimenez.

"It is the property of the Spanish navy, government and people, and we want it all back," said Teodoro de Leste Contreras, a navy admiral who runs a naval museum owned by the Culture Ministry.

The Spanish government filed evidence Thursday backing up its claim with a U.S. federal judge hearing the case in Tampa.

Goold said U.S. Magistrate Judge Mark Pizzo will now convene the two parties to review the case before deciding who gets to keep the treasure, now held in a warehouse somewhere in Tampa.

Goold said he expected Odyssey would keep "not a penny" of the salvage. Odyssey officials have said they believe the court will award them the majority of the treasure, as it was found by Odyssey.

Odyssey officials maintain there isn't enough evidence to prove the vessel is the Mercedes, mainly because there is no hull. They said they have found only cargo from a shipwreck, not the actual vessel, according to a statement the company released Thursday.

Odyssey officials said they are surprised the Spanish government has conclusively said "the "Black Swan" treasure is from the Mercedes after viewing site photomosaics and video that show no hull, ballast pile, keel or vessel, and only a statistically insignificant sample of the coins from the site," the statement said.

Spain argues the entire treasure should be returned to it because naval vessels never cease to be the property of the nation that flagged them, regardless of where they lay, under the principle of sovereign immunity, Goold said.

"Spain has not abandoned or otherwise relinquished in any way its ownership of Mercedes," Spain argued in Thursday's court filing.

If the coins are found to be from the Mercedes, Odyssey officials said "it is up to the U.S. District Court to determine the final disposition of the "Black Swan" treasure," according to the statement.

Odyssey announced in May 2007 it had discovered the wreck in the Atlantic and raised 500,000 silver coins and other artifacts worth an estimated $500 million. It said at the time it did not know what ship it was. Odyssey flew the booty back to Tampa without Spain's knowledge from an airport on the British colony of Gibraltar on Spain's southwestern tip.

Spain went to the U.S. federal court claiming ownership of the treasure if it turned out to be connected to the country's national heritage.

Goold said Spain's evidence - based on material provided by Odyssey under court order - proved the ship and cargo were definitely Spanish property.

Naval and coin experts said they had absolute proof Odyssey's salvage proceeded from the Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes, which exploded and sank in a naval battle as it sailed back to Spain from South America.

The coins aboard the ship included gold doubloons or "pieces of eight" minted in 1803 in Lima, Peru, bearing the image of Spain's King Carlos IV, said ministry coin expert Carmen Marcos.

In its filing with the U.S. court, Spain said: "Analysis of location information from multiple sources confirms the location on the seabed from which Odyssey took coins and other artifacts is the site of Mercedes."

Artifacts on the seabed, and their distribution and other characteristics, as well as artifacts taken by Odyssey "further identify the site as the remains of Mercedes," the Spanish filing says.

Odyssey had sought to kept private its information on the ship, including its identity. Pizzo last month forced the company to turn over its information and Odyssey said the ship was probably the Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes.

[neo-primal]

Wait, where did the Spanish get that gold? Wasn''t it taken from someone else? Didn''t it once belong to the Inca? If Spain''s absurd demand wins them gold that they had lost forever perhaps they should give it back to the Quechua Indians in South America. It''s only fair.

[breogan-2009]

Es vergonzoso que ingleses y americanos no respeten ni el patrimonio submarino, ni lo que son tumbas marinas, donde escansan los retos de cientos de marinos espaqoles. No creo que Odyssey expoliara para repartir el tesoro con los indigenas latinoamericanos, y encima han mentido y sacado el tesoro a escondidas como verdaderos ladrones. Hay unas leyes internacionales y deben ser respetadas. Y me importa una mierda ese tesoro, ojala se pudan los piratas de tanta avaricia. Pero las leyes son iguales para todos. Que pasaria si el barco tuviese bandera americana o inglesa y fuera expoliado por espaqoles?

[breogan-2009]

Yo me pregunto que opinarian los americanos si una empresa espaqola entrara en las Torres Gemelas o en un barco americano hundido en Pearl Harbord y se pusiera a robar todo lo que encontrara. Imagino que les pareceria inmoral profanar un sitio donde descansan cientos de seres humanos, una propiedad suya. Pues esto es exactamente igual. El oro es importantes, pero mas lo es respetar las leyes y los seres humanos. Y no creo que el gobierno espaqol si gana esta batalla reparta el oro o lo meta en el banco, imagino que ira a parar a algun museo. Y a los que hablan de los espaqoles les recuerdo que hay cientos de buques hundidos en nuestras aguas y ahi siguen, no nos importa el maldito oro. Y si nosotros no queremos que se toque, tampoco vamos a permitir que otros lo expolien de nuestros galeones o aguas.

[edlo3]

so probably these coins were stolen from a central or suthern american country, lets say its theirs since it has hacked right, maybe the way it was taken out of the country was ilegal, and say it hacked out of the kings of that country through force and there was no transaction made, and if there was one, we need to know what it was, and if paid taxes too....

[breogan-2009]

Desde luedo de existir un reparto del tesoro, esa empresa inmoral y expoliadora no debe recibir absolutamente nada por profanadora, mentirosa y expoliadora. El tesoro deberia repartirse entre la armada espaqola y los descendientes de los marinos muertos, es estado espaqol, el pais de origen del oro.
Odyssey estaba supuestamente en el sur de Espaqa para buscar un galeon ingles hundido en aguas espaqolas y se toparon con este galeon espaqol entonces fueron sacando las monedas del fondo del mar y las enviaron a USA via Gibraltar en avion. Luego no quisieron dar ni el lugar de localizacion ni el nombre del galeon. Pero fueron pillados con las manos en la masa.Pillados por satelite y por la historia, pq Espaqa tiene documentada su historia y donde se hundio cada galeon.

[bgwinnett]

$5oo million is a bit of piddly sum of money for a country of Spain''s magnitude. Now if were 500 billion Dollars... that would be totally different...they''d be able to drag themselves out of their housing slump for starters.

[usmcvn2]

Posted by breogan at 05:07 AM : May 09, 2008



Press one (1) to read breogan''s comment. LOL

[excoachken]

Trying to re-read history by skipping a few vital chapters is as foolish as paying reparations to descendants of former slaves. To take one period of time, whether it be the sketchy record of a ship to determine who gets a pile of money or the undocumented daily life of an individual slave and make the gross assumtion that all other facts surrounding that claim are identical is a mistake. World history is a complete package, not meant to be dissected via misinformation for the personal gain of a 21st century group of opportunists. It is hard enough to determine the truth of 9/11 without trying to go back hundreds of years to explain why a present day person, with no previous knowledge or sense of that experience, should become instantly wealthy over such a circumstance!

[gslinger3]

Finders KLeepers.......... mantenimiento Buscadores

[breogan-2009]

No estoy deacuerdo con que el oro es de los latinoamericanos, otra cosa es que pueda compatirse. El oro es de la madre tierra, que es de donde salio. No fue robado pq entonces Peru nisiquiera existia como pais, era parte del reino de Espaqa. Y ese oro serbia para pagar a los ejercitos espaqoles que se ocupaban de garantizar la seguiridad de todos los ciudadanos del imperio. Seguridad frente a piratas o ejercitos invasores.
No se yo quien de los actuales habitantes de Peru ha trabajado en minas para sacar ese oro. Los derechos en todo caso serian para los peruanos de hace siglo, no de los actuales. No sabemos si ese oro fue robado, fue regalado o es fruto de un intercambio comercial o tributos.
Lo unico cierto es que fue sacado del fondo del mar de un buque con bandera espaqola. Y segun las leyes del s.XXI esto es ilegal y el tesoro es propiedad del pais de la bandera del barco, que en este caso es Espaqa.
Algundia USA tendra que pagar todo lo que ha hecho a Espaqa historicamente. Desde la autoexpulsion del Maine que sirvio (igual que el 911 y Pearl Harbor) para justificar la guerra, pasando por el olvido historico a la contribucion espaqola en la independencia de USA de Reino Unido y terminando por el apoyo a la dictadura franquista.

[breogan-2009]

drinuk antes de hablar de Espaqa deberias estudiar la historia, la verdadera no la manipulada de la leyenda negra.
Espaqa fue a america a llevar la civilizacion occidental y evangelizar un continente donde moria mas gente por sacrificios humanos que por los invasores. Los pocos soldados espaqoles que conquistaron ese enorme continente no podrian con los nativos si no fuera pq muchos pueblos sometidos se iban uniendo a los espaqoles. Eramos los LIBERTADORES del pasado, igual que hoy dicen ser los USA, aunque ustedes hacen guerras por oil como la de irak.
Cuantos indigenas quedaron en los USA y cuantos en Sudamerica. En las colonias espaqoles existio mestizaje en las inglesas no.
Iberia (Espaqa y Portugal) es la tierra de los verdaderos hebreos y eran los verdaderos hebreos los que tenian que hacer la union de las 4 razas en el nuevo mundo. Y asi fue.
Nosotros dejamos paises civilizados donde habia dictaduras y sacrificios humanos. Si hoy esos paises estan empobrecidos sera por culpa de ellos mismos y sus gobernates corruptos.

[breogan-2009]

Yes, but i think LA,LA,LA is best song than Congratulations jeje.
I hate dictador Franco but he was correct and made a good job. Always neighbours votes and We only have portugueses, french and andorran votes.

[bgwinnett]

Yes, but i think LA,LA,LA is best song than Congratulations jeje.
I hate dictador Franco but he was correct and made a good job. Always neighbours votes and We only have portugueses, french and andorran votes.

Posted by breogan at 08:01 AM : May 09, 2008

Hows things in Spain with housing slump -- you guys got it first am I wrong? -- and the Euro?

[drinuk]

bgwinnett,
Spanish Housing ! They allow folks in from all over the world, sell them houses and then five years later tell them they were built illegally and bulldoze them. No jail for the local officials who approved them, no recompense from developers, nothing ! They are a bunch of crooks, far worse than the Mafia.

They should not get one penny from this treasure, it never was their''s.

[consciousnes]

They stole it from the Americas once by murdering the americans that had it now they are trying to steel it again through the courts.
But then it is a lawyer''s world. The laws have been passed to protect the wealthy.

[sverre5-2009]

Apologies for double posting, the website messed up.

[nor-one]

Good american thinking "drinuk" let''s take it one step further and shut those pesky redskins of ours up once and for all. They got their aces kicked now forget the treaty BS and live with it. No more free ride! remember if it''s not nailed down it must belong to the good old USA!

[louiville2]

The new Spanish fleet have glass bottom boats so they can review the last Spanish Fleet.

[excoachken]

If the Spanish insist upon this folly, I suggest that the descendants of the Carribean natives that Columbus kidnapped and took back to a life of slavery in Spain, receive ALL the wealth of this ship!

[Scooter68]

Well, lets solve this problem the easy way. Let the salvage team take the gold back out there and dump in back into the ocean. If Spain is so certain the gold is their''s let them go find it and retrieve it. The Odessey owners should get that gold off dry land immediately and be ready to dump it back if the court ruling goes against them, unless Spain is willing to pay at least a 50-60% share as a finders fee to the salvage team. What was Spain doing all these years while "their" gold was out there?

[Martha Z]

This is similar to when someone finds a wallet on the sidewalk. The right thing to do is return it to it''s owner. It belongs to Spain.

[Martha Z]

This is similar to when someone finds a wallet on the sidewalk. The right thing to do is to return it to it''s owner. It belongs to Spain.

[rushlimpdrug]

Return it to Spain
because Spain''s history is full of honest
citizenry going throught the world
spreading justice.

right?

[lfmontes]

So the Angloamericans are now resurrecting the Black Legend against Spain in order to protect a bunch of pirates ( Odyssey). If I were you I would be careful when accusing Spain of genocide and looting in the Americas. To start with, our colonial record - given the times, we talk about early modern history- is far more human than yours. We built towns, roads and universities for the Indians and passed laws to protect them. You go now to most Latin American countries and you will find that a large part of the population is either Indian or mixed ( where is then the genocide?) How many Indians are left in North America?. The anglos either killed them or reduced them to concentration camps. And what is that tale about returning the ship''s treasure to the "legitimate owners"? The legitimate government at the time was the Spanish Monarchy, like it or not. That is the law. Besides, why do not you apply your logic to all the wealth the British and the US have looted to other people throughout the ages? You will end up begging. Finally, the ship we are talking about was sank without a declaration of war by the British piratical navy...remember Pearl Harbour?. All in all, the anglos should shut up in this and other similar cases or you risk being exposed as a bunch of hypocrytes.

Finally I recommend you anglos read the book Tree of Hate: Propaganda and Prejudices Affecting United States Relations with the Hispanic World. By Philip Wayne Powell. You will learn a lot.

[darnedsocks]

HASN''T THE STATUE OF LIMITATIONS EXPIRED ON THIS? ALSO, DIDN''T THE SPANIARDS STEAL THIS GOLD FROM THE INCAS? PERHAPS THE MEXICANS SHOULD SUE THE SPANIARDS FOR IT?! OH, YES, I FORGOT, THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS MAY HAVE RUN OUT FOR THE MEXICANS TOO!

[darnedsocks]

IT DOESN''T BELONG TO SPAIN. LOSERS WEEPERS, FINDERS KEEPERS! HA!

[acolton1]

Spain should have been looking for this treasure from day one. Now somebody else finds it and they want to lay claim to it. AS QUOTED FROM ABOVE "The Spanish warship was sunk by the British navy southwest of Portugal in 1804 with more than 200 people on board"

Thats 204 years ago. I would consider that LOST and if SPAIN WANTED THAT TREASURE THEY SHOULD HAVE BEEN LOOKING FOR IT and now they are crying FOWL that somebody else found their treasure they lost 204 years ago. They can kiss my black ***, SPAIN DOES NOT DESERVE ANYTING. 204 YEARS AGO hahahahahaha they deserve nothing.

[acolton1]

It says The Spanish warship was sunk by the British navy. THATS CONSIDERED THE SPOILS OF WAR during that ERA.

SPAIN GETS NOTHING.

[godseyesore-2009]

What a two-faced gluttonous government! First they steal from another continent and then demand its return to them as "their property". They should get only the rotting timbers of the ship (at their expense), and nothing of its cargo. The cargo should go to original owner, minus some percentage for salvage effort of Odyssey Explorer. Spain has no brain.

[mediapreachr]

If the Odyssey wants to do any more exploring-they will return the silver and doubloons asap.
I bet the whole outfit value surpasses 500 mil and you don''t want to get impounded;also,don''t forget the lawyers cost a lot.
Imagine spending millions to defend the case than losing anyway.Cut your losses now.

[delezo]

You should read a report from The New Yorker about what kind of "explorting" does that company Odyssey:

"In 2001, the UN adopted a Convention for the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage, which seeks to thwart the activities of treasure hunters by prohibiting the sale of looted artifacts over a hundred years old. The arrival of treasure hunters in the deepest parts of the ocean has also caused concern among nautical archeologists, some of whom have accused treasure hunters of destroying wreck sites in search of valuables and of selling salvaged artifacts to the public through auction houses, Web sites, etc."

"(...) Odyssey, which has an average monthly operating budget of about $2 million, has conducted its salvage operations with great secrecy, and allowed few independent experts to examine the wreck sites or artifacts it%u2019s retrieved (...)".

[darnedsocks]

"(...) Odyssey, which has an average monthly operating budget of about $2 million, has conducted its salvage operations with great secrecy, and allowed few independent experts to examine the wreck sites or artifacts it%u2019s retrieved (...)".

WELL, OF COURSE, THEY ARE NOT GOING TO ADVERTISE THEY FOUND THE SHIP FULL OF LOOT, IF THEY HAVE INVESTED A BUNCH OF MONEY ALREADY TO FIND THE THING! DUH! ONLY AN IDIOT WOULD DO THAT! THIS IS NOT UN-ETHICAL, IT IS SOUND BUSINESS!

[roger_inkart]

Perhaps if Spain considers paying trillions in reparations to the indigenous people of South America after they raped and pillaged their land they we could begin to consider returning their gold to them.

[roger_inkart]

''The coins aboard the ship included gold doubloons or "pieces of eight" minted in 1803 in Lima, Peru''

So, this is gold taken from South America then? Why shouldn''t the people of Peru get it?

Spain raped the continent, murdered countless thousands of people, destroyed entire cultures all in the name of greed and conquest. They should get nothing but scorn.

[lfmontes]

Those anglos who insist on Spain giving the treasure back to the indigenous peoples in America have to be simply stupid. Do not they realize that the entire US is stolen property from native Indians and Mexicans? Go down that way and you will end up with nothing...

As to the South Americans who maybe tempted to claim that treasure back the answer is: to whom? to the Incas or Aztecs who had eslaved and massacred entire populations during their empire building?. If just a few hundred Spaniards conquered them it was because they were received as liberators by the poor Indian masses that had suffered the tyranny of the precolumbian empires for centuries.

[darnedsocks]

HEY, I SAW A SPECIAL ON TV THE OTHER DAY THAT SHOWED EVIDENCE THAT THE INCAS CAPTURED, SACRIFICED, AND ATE THE SPANIARDS. BECAUSE THEY WERE SO PRIMITIVE, THEY BELIEVED IN HUMAN SACRIFICES TO PLEASE THEIR GOD. MAYBE THE SPANIARDS SHOULD GET REPARATIONS FROM THE MEXICANS AND SUE THEM FOR TORTURING AND CANNIBALIZING THEIR SOLDIERS?! HEE, HEE....THIS IS GREAT! EVERYBODY CAN SUE EVERYBODY! THE LAWYERS ARE GOING TO RUN OFF WITH THE GOLD!

[acolton1]

Spain should get nothing if they wanted the treasure they should have been looking for it a long time ago and made statements to the media that they were looking for this specific treasure and sunken ship.

How about this story :

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/05/09/katrina.powerball.ap/index.html

[acolton1]

I bet some of these coins and gold and silver were taken from the indigenous people of South America and plundered and re-melted into other coins. So TECHNICALLY the Spanish people took the SPOILS OF WAR FOR THEM SELVES and the The Spanish warship was sunk by the British navy southwest of Portugal in 1804 and lost for 204 years. DURING THAT ERA that was the SPOILS OF WAR and SPAIN DESERVES NOTHING because they were not even looking for it in the first place they considered it LOST otherwise they would have been looking for it Treasure years ago. The SPANISH have side scanning sonar and metal detectors and ships they could have used to find it but they were too LAZY to try to find the treasure. NOW SOMEBODY ELSE FOUND THEIR TREASURE AND THEY WANT IT WWWWWWaaaaaaa SPAIN DESERVES NOTHING.

[acolton1]

I saw on TV there is another ship that sank and they think that there is Gold, Silver and GEMS other stuff and is worth almost 2 billion dollars and that was a Spanish War Gallion also. So when somebody finds that is Spain going to claim that also. ?????

[actornaught]

...is Spain going to claim that also. ?????
Posted by acolton1 at 12:14 PM : May 09, 2008

I have a little Spain floating here in my pocket...

[imaok1]

Spain raped the continent, murdered countless thousands of people, destroyed entire cultures all in the name of greed and conquest. They should get nothing but scorn.
-Posted by roger_inkart

...says the American who is now sitting on land that once belonged to the Native Americans. Oooo- wait, but that was different, right?

[delezo]

imaok1, you are wrong. When the US "raped the continent, murdered countless thousands of people, destroyed entire cultures, etc" it wasn''t "all in the name of greed and conquest", but rather in the name of freedom and democracy. Native northamericans needed to be liberated. Just like the iraq people etc.

I recommend US treasure hunting companies to dig and loot their own warships and not other nation''s. Go to Pearl Harbor, Midway... And don''t ask for the Gov''s permission, see what happens.

[yongamerica]

Spain can QQ all they want. Spain has never shown any interest in finding this sunken vessel, much less recovering any item off this ship. Spain is showing that it has never lost it''s greed and lust for gold. After all this gold was stolen from the Aztecs, which means Mexico has a more legitimate claim to this treasure than Spain.

[rushman71]

Don''t the spanish sound like Daffy Duck? "It''s mine!!! Mine!!! Mine!!! Mine!!! Mine!!! All MINE!!!"

[rushman71]

jennasmith2: 0. They leave it up to a US company to do it all for them, then they raise he11 to claim it as their own. Pinche, spanish pendejos!!!

[rjs1955]

Since Peru is now a sovereign country and apparently the coins originated there, mined, transported, and made with the pain, sweat, toil and death of nearly-enslaved colonial Peruvians... I say the booty belongs to Peru, with Odyssey Marine keeping an amount equal to the expense of finding the treasure and a reasonable finder''s fee, like 15% (or $75 million plus expenses).

[frankky18]

That is gold stolen from native South Americans so it
belongs in South America not in the hands of those
Spanish thiefs.

[breogan-2009]

stolen?.South Americans was part of Spain.
Donde estan las pruebas para demostrar que fue robado y no parte de un intercambio o tributos. O es que la seguridad de la armada espaqola y las mercancias compradas en otros puntos no tenian un coste para Sudamerica, igual que para el resto de espaqoles.
En todo caso seria un robo a la madre tierra, la verdaera propietaria del oro.

[talkingham]

Where ever Desoto went, 98% of the native population vanished or were killed. Numerous aboriginal tribes we don''t even know the names of perished because Desoto and his religious advisors made sure they killed anyone who new enough astronomy required to plant crops at the right time etc and killed off most of their leaders. It was the Creek, Cherokee, and Choctaws who moved into much of the ethnically cleansed zones left behind by the wonderful Spaniard Desoto and his cut throats. We (the USA) later replayed this scenario on the "replacment" tribes with the Trail of Tears ripping the heart out of the Indian Nations in the South. Besides the previous tribes, even small tribes such as the Yuchis who could harm no one were sent to die on resrervations in Oklhouma. An incredible legacy of cultural diversity was wipted out, perhaps even the true history of how these people came to be in the Southeast. Tribes such as the Yuchis, looked mroe like Pakistanis than traditional western tribes, down to the clothing and various language components.

Regardless, Spain has an infinite amount of gall to try to claim these spoils of war after still lingering disaster they visited upon the "new world".

[ubrew12]

"Spain has not abandoned or otherwise relinquished in any way its ownership of Mercedes," Spain argued

He added: ''We just decided to store it at the bottom of the Caribbean for 100 years until some enterprising Americans found it for us.''

Lawyers.... sheesh!!