The feds on Thursday agreed to ship the skeletal remains of 18 dinosaurs back to Mongolia after finding the smuggled fossils during a criminal investigation.
The remains, between 68 million and 80 million years old, had been looted from sites in the Gobi desert and smuggled into the United States.
Their repatriation comes a month after paleontologist Eric Prokopi was sentenced to three months in prison for his involvement in a smuggling scheme.
“This is a historic moment for the US Attorney’s Office — in addition to being a prehistoric event — and we are proud to participate in the return of these dinosaur skeletons to their rightful home,” said Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara, who displayed some of the bones during a repatriation ceremony in Manhattan.“A recovery of this sort is really without precedent.”
Mongolia is constructing a natural-history museum where the fossils may be displayed, Bharara said.
The remains include two Tyrannosaurus bataar skeletons, a fossilized egg and a well-preserved “nest” of several oviraptor skeletons.
“The people of Mongolia can now restore them and display them as symbols of their status as a star within the paleontological firmament and astonishing symbols of Mongolian national pride,” Bharara said.
All told, the investigation by federal prosecutors and customs agents has yielded remains from 31 dinosaurs, officials said.
A Tyrannosaurus bataar skeleton was sent back to Mongolia last year.
“Fossil looting is a huge problem worldwide,” Mark Norell, a curator in charge of the paleontology division at the American Museum of Natural History, said at the ceremony.
Prokopi pleaded guilty in 2012 to three felony counts and cooperated with prosecutors in recovering fossils, including some previously unknown to authorities.
The probe has led to other investigations into possibly illegally imported fossils in Wyoming, California and New York, prosecutors said at his sentencing in June.