[CPProt.net] Stolen documents showed up on eBay

[MSN CPPnet]

Stolen documents showed up on eBay
By Sam Kusic
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Wednesday, June 1, 2005 

An Ohio resident accused of trying to sell stolen, 200-year-old Indiana
County Courthouse records waived his right to a preliminary hearing on
Tuesday. 

Gary E. Saum, 60, of 121 Louise Lane, Athens, Ohio, faces 20 counts of
criminal attempt to commit receiving stolen property. The property in this
case is old county records that date between 1811 and 1826 and that should
be shelved in a courthouse basement storage room. 

Instead, some of them are, for the time being, in the possession of Trooper
Robert W. Erdely, who brought the charges against Saum. 

The charges are the result of Erdely's investigation, which started when a
genealogical researcher found one of the documents listed for sale on eBay. 

That document, a fornication and bastardy indictment, is dated March 1811.
It accuses yeoman William Clark of having a child out of wedlock with a
woman named Catharine Lites. At the time, such an act was against the law.
It's signed by then Pennsylvania Attorney General Richard Rush, who later
became the Secretary of the Treasury under President John Quincy Adams. 

Kathy Dean, the prothonotary's microfilm office supervisor, said the
researcher thought it odd that such a document would be for sale. So, the
researcher called the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, which
keeps microfilm copies of county records. 

Dean said commission officials confirmed that the document should be in the
possession of the county and not be for sale. The commission called the
Indiana County prothonotary's office, which then contacted state police. 

It fell to Erdely, a member of the state police computer crimes task force,
to look into the matter. 

According to court documents, he found that a company called Ira & Larry
Goldberg Coins & Collectibles, in Beverly Hills, Calif., was the seller.
Company officials said they were selling the document on behalf of Saum. 

By way of a court order, Erdely got a hold of records of Saum's transactions
over eBay and with the company. 

Through those, he found 19 other county records that had been or were being
sold on eBay between April 2003 and January 2004, according to court
documents. 

Those records are called constable returns, quarterly statistical records
that list among other things the number of deer killed, the number of
children born out of wedlock and number of slaves taken in all the
townships. 

Nine of the documents were already sold for $9 to $19. Erdely said he was
able to recover the others. 

"Who knew it would be interesting to anybody outside our county," said Dean.
"I guess I was surprised anybody would be interested enough in them to take
them." 

Saum is only charged with attempting to receive stolen property, not
actually stealing the documents. 

Dean and Prothonotary Linda Moore-Mack said they aren't sure how the
documents were removed from the courthouse. 

Dean, however, said she thinks she vaguely remembers seeing Saum in the
storage room at some point in the past, but she said she isn't sure. 

"I can't commit to it," she said. 

The room is open to the public. 

Dean said she is frustrated that some of the documents she is tasked with
preserving were taken. 

Saum and his attorney both declined comment yesterday. 

In return for waiving his hearing, Saum will likely be accepted in the
Accelerated Rehabilitative Disposition program. 

The program doesn't require defendants to enter a guilty plea, but it does
require that they be on probation for up to two years. At the end of that
time, they can apply to have their records expunged. 


Sam Kusic can be reached at skusic at tribweb.com or 724.463.8742.