Jason McElroy '02 Published in Communications and Entertainment Law Journal

May 13, 2005

May 13, 2005, Greencastle, Ind. - Jason McElroy -- a 2002 graduate of DePauw University who is expected to graduate from the Washington College of Law at American University later this month -- is published in the Spring 2005 (Vol. 27, No. 3)edition of Comm/Ent: Hastings Communications and Entertainment Law Journal. McElroy's essay is entitled: "The War Against Illegal Antiquities Trade: Rules of Engagement for Source Nations." Comm/Ent is published by Hastings College of The Law at the University of California. (photo at left from 2001 Mirage)

In the notes accompanying the text, McElroy -- who was a classical studies major at DePauw -- thanks "Pedar Foss, Rebecca Schindler, Carl Huffman, and Dave Guinee, members of the classical studies faculty at DePauw University." The piece itself references Elmali, a town in Turkey where Professors Foss and Schindler have been taking DePauw students since 2000.

"The current war in Iraq has brought the world's attention once again to the fate of our history and the means through which we know it," Jason McElroy writes. "As the war in the country that now stands in the Fertile Crescent between the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers wore on, looters invaded museums and libraries and stole, burned or destroyed thousands of Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian, and Babylonian treasures. These treasures contained information about many of the world's first known cities, legal systems and language -- and much of this information may be lost forever." McElroy notes that the problem is widespread in other countries and that "illicit trade in stolen art and artifacts ... has become the third largest contributor to international crime."

His contribution to the journal proposes "a set of guidelines by which source nations can better prepare themselves for the inevitable attempt to retrieve what has been taken from them."

Learn more about Comm/Ent, the nation's preeminent law journal covering the rubric of communications, entertainment, and intellectual property law, by clicking here.

Back