Day/date: October 8, 1987


                                 FIELD INCIDENT REPORT

Incident type: Looting of Shipwrecks
Log number: 87-243
Date/time of incident: 10/4                         Date/time received: 10/8, am
Park: Channel Islands    Location: Offshore waters
Reported by: Tim Setnicka, CR, CHIS (via WRO)
Received by: Bill Halainen, RAD, WASO

Summary:
Undercover park rangers discovered that divers had been engaging in unlawful
removal of historical artifacts from federally protected shipwrecks in
Channel Islands National Park and in Channel Islands Marine Sanctuary.
Acting on this information, park rangers, National Marine Fishery Service
agents and Santa Barbara Sheriff's Office deputies boarded the charter dive
vessel Vision, owned by Truth Aquatics of Santa Barbara. They found
that divers on the ship, which had been chartered for a three-day diving
trip, had removed hundreds of artifacts from the wreck sites of the Winfield
Scott and the Golden Horn, both of which sank in the 1800's.
Investigators interviewed approximately 25 of the divers and crew aboard the
Vision, and, as a result of their findings, about 20 cases will be referred
for prosecution to the Southwest Regional Office of the General Counsel of
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. An additional ten
cases will be referred to the Santa Barbara County District Attorney for
prosecution.

Persons involved:
Name                                 Address             DOB or age
                                 *** Not given ***