Posted on 06/06/2007 6:12:05 PM PDT by blam
Spain traps US ships in row over treasure
By Mike Elkin in Madrid
Last Updated: 1:38am BST 07/06/2007
A Spanish court has issued a warrant for the capture and search of two American exploration ships suspected of removing sunken treasure from Spanish waters.
The ships, belonging to Odyssey Marine Exploration, which is based in Florida, are docked in Gibraltar and cannot leave because Spain controls the waters surrounding the British enclave.
A Spanish Culture Ministry spokeswoman said investigations by the Civil Guard, the Defence Ministry and Spanish prosecutors produced sufficient evidence to suspect that the vessels were operating illegally in the Alboran Sea, the western-most part of the Mediterranean Sea.
Madrid does not believe they carry precious cargo. It is interested in the ships' papers.
The court order follows a class action suit the Spanish government filed last month in a United States federal court to ensure that its property rights for anything in Odyssey's possession were honoured.
Madrid alleges that the 17 tons of gold and silver coins, worth an estimated £250 million, that Odyssey removed from undisclosed European waters may belong to the Spanish government.
The claim requests that Odyssey provides information on three alleged discoveries: the British sailing ship Merchant Royal, which sank off the Isles of Scilly in 1641 carrying Spanish cargo; an unnamed wreck which could be the British warship Sussex, which sank off Spain in 1694; and an Italian ship which sank near Sardinia.
Preliminary reports suggest the treasure hailed from the Merchant Royal, resting off the British coast.
Covington and Burling, Spain's lawyers in the United States, said that the Merchant Royal was in the service of Spain when it sank and thus the cargo belongs to Madrid.
F--- Spain.
Is this John Edwards booty?
How about just airlifting the cargo off?
Your's is a far simpler and more intelligent response.
Mine was a more immediate, from the gut reaction.
“If we are able to confirm that some other entity has a legitimate legal claim to this shipwreck when - and if - the identity is confirmed, we intend to provide legal notice to any and all potential claimants. Even if another entity is able to prove that it has an ownership interest in the shipwreck and/or cargo and that they had not legally abandoned the shipwreck, Odyssey would apply for a salvage award from the Admiralty Court. In cases such as this, salvors are typically awarded up to 90% of the recovery.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/070531/20070531005698.html?.v=1
It’s plain old piracy!
Avast!
I think Morgan Mint just bought this original find from the salvage company.
I'm sure that Spain is simply anxious to get the gold so they can return it to Americas from where they stole it.
We can pay the cost of this war with a temporary tax on phones just like we did the last time.
Maybe we can temporarily tax the internet too.
TOP INSTITUTIONAL HOLDERS
Holder Shares % Out Value* Reported
FORTRESS INVESTMENT HOLDINGS LLC 4,631,740 9.86 $16,859,533 31-Mar-07
GLG PARTNERS LP 4,194,000 8.93 $15,266,160 31-Mar-07
JANUS CAPITAL MANAGEMENT, LLC 1,840,445 3.92 $6,699,219 31-Mar-07
DIMENSIONAL FUND ADVISORS INC 924,866 1.97 $3,366,512 31-Mar-07
SHAW D.E. & CO., INC. 874,000 1.86 $3,181,360 31-Mar-07
VANGUARD GROUP, INC. (THE) 674,127 1.44 $2,453,822 31-Mar-07
GALLEON MANAGEMENT L.P. 600,520 1.28 $2,185,892 31-Mar-07
MERRILL LYNCH & CO., INC. 414,859 .88 $1,510,086 31-Mar-07
COLUMBIA PARTNERS, L.L.C, INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT 411,962 .88 $1,499,541 31-Mar-07
GOLDMAN, JAY, G. 147,091 .31 $535,411 31-Mar-07
Why should we lift a finger to help these grave robbers?
Yes it is. Worth $19 to $24 million to him alone.
According to a previous post here on FR, that is exactly what they have done.
I think I would air mail all my papers home and sell the ships at the dock too.
snip
Gibraltar’s government said the haul had nothing to do with the Sussex, a British flagship, which sank in a storm in 1694. But Ministry of Defence personnel said an Odyssey ship berthed in Gibraltar’s naval dock last week and a specially-chartered American Airlines plane landed in the British colony on Wednesday before loading cargo and flying to Tampa, Florida, where Odyssey is headquartered.
http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=792292007
REMEMBER THE MAINE!!
RENAME IT THE MAINE!!
With its 116 cannon, the Santissima Trinidad may look like a formidable warship, but I'm betting that our Yankee clippers can outrun her before she can get off the first broadside volley.
Load the ships full of passengers who follow Islam. Toss out a few random Spanish train schedules. Whisper something that sounds like ETA. Problem solved.
Because it’s originally (South) American gold and because they are Americans.
Yoo Whooo, Odyssey, who contracted you for the Spain Treasure hunt????
FYI, more Odyssey stories under FR Keyword search OMR:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=omr
LOL
If we must, ok. But please, spare La Rioja and the Cruzcampo Cerveza brewery. My life would be immeasurably worse without either!
If the ship was in international waters then whoever gets to it first is the owner.
If I had the resources I would have gone after it too.
It’s already in Florida.
They are not all Americans. These are a variety of int'l investors in an offshore LLC.
If they aren't, then prepare to forfeit them forever to any other country that wants to take them.
Looks like it spooked the shareholders a little too...
http://stockcharts.com/c-sc/sc?chart=OMR,uu[h,a]daclyyay[pb50!b200!f][vc60][iue12,26,9!lc20]
America must defend right of access within British waters? That is what was advocated in a prior post.
It trades on the AMEX under the symbol: OMR
SELL MORTAMER SELLL!!!!!!
Odyssey Marine Exploration should dump the gold where they found it and tell Spain to go find it!
MADRID: A Spanish court has ordered the civil guard to detain and search two vessels that belong to a U.S. company that said last month it had found what could be the richest haul to date from a wrecked colonial-era ship.
The order adds a new twist to the escalating row between the Spanish government and Odyssey Marine Exploration, which announced May 18 it had recovered the treasure, whose value is estimated at €370 million, or $500 million, at an undisclosed location in the Atlantic Ocean.
The court in Cádiz, on Spain’s southern coast, ordered the police to detain two boats belonging to Odyssey Marine Exploration if they left Gibraltar, a British colony on the southern tip of Spain, and entered Spanish waters. The boats, the Odyssey Explorer and the Ocean Alert, are believed by Spain to have been involved in the haul, although the owners declined to confirm this Wednesday.
Odyssey has said the shipwreck was beyond the territorial waters of any country, which means the group is entitled to keep the bounty unless any country or party makes a case for rightful ownership. The company flew the treasure, which included 500,000 gold and silver coins, from Gibraltar to Tampa, Florida.
Greg Stemm, one of the chairmen of Odyssey Marine Exploration, said in a telephone interview that the Spanish civil guard had an “open invitation” to inspect the boats.
Today in Americas
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Earlier this year, Spain gave Odyssey permission to search the wreck of the HMS Sussex, a British ship that sank, laden with coins, off the coast of Gibraltar in 1694, but Odyssey has denied the salvaged treasure came from the Sussex.
The court order says that journeys logged by the Explorer and the Alert between December and April indicate the boats had not left Spanish waters in the Mediterranean and that any claim that the boats recovered treasure in the Atlantic is “absolutely false.”
The court called those involved in the recovery “pirate bounty hunters,” and pointed a finger at the authorities in Gibraltar, claiming that they must have known what was in the aircraft that flew the coins to the United States.
Carmen Calvo, the culture minister, told the state radio station late Tuesday that she had the support of the defense minister, José Antonio Alonso, who told her that naval ships could be used to intercept the boats if necessary
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/06/news/booty.php
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Ordering foreign flagged vessels detained in other waters seems designed to bring about a confrontation.
- and that makes me refer to my tagline.
Your point about the US not having to defend legal status within British waters would certainly be correct, although there are treaties that obligate them to do so.
Thanks for the post. -bill
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