[Tlc] UW Guest Speaker Dies at SeaTac Detention Center

[Charles Keyes]

This is a truly tragic end for Roxanna.

Biff Keyes

> Museum director in antiquities probe dies in federal custody
>
> By Mike Carter
>
> Seattle Times staff reporter
>
> A renowned Asian antiquities expert, indicted in Los Angeles in connection 
> with a federal investigation into illegal trafficking of pilfered 
> Southeast Asian art, has died in custody at the Federal Detention Center 
> in SeaTac.
>
> Roxanna Brown, the director of the Southeast Asian Ceramics Museum at 
> Bangkok University in Thailand, was found dead around 2:30 a.m., said FDC 
> spokeswoman Maggie Ogden.
>
> Brown was arrested at her hotel last Friday as she prepared to have dinner 
> with colleagues from the University of Washington, where she was scheduled 
> to speak Saturday, according to news reports.
>
> Ogden said the cause of Brown's death is under investigation. Brown had 
> complained of being ill after her arrest and her scheduled appearance 
> before a U.S. magistrate Monday was postponed because she didn't feel 
> well. Emily Langlie, the spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office in 
> Seattle, said Brown was able to appear in court Tuesday and that her 
> extradition to Los Angeles to answer the charges was pending.
>
> Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Johns, the Los Angeles prosecutor heading 
> the illegal antiquities investigation, said Brown was "one of many 
> targets" of the probe. He declined to say how her death would affect the 
> investigation.
>
> Brown, 62, who lived in Bangkok, was indicted on a single count of wire 
> fraud for allegedly allowing her electronic signature to be used on 
> appraisal forms of items donated to museums. Those appraisals, according 
> to court documents, were inflated so that the donors could claim 
> fraudulent tax deductions.
>
>
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