The most serious charges against the Delaware man accused of stealing the left thumb of a 2,000-year-old Chinese sculpture have been dropped as part of a plea agreement. On April 17, he will be sentenced in federal court.
Bear resident Michael Rohana was at an ugly sweater party in December 2017 at the Franklin Institute, a Philadelphia museum. While there he broke off the thumb of a terra cotta warrior. The statue, discovered at the tomb of China’s first emperor, had been on view for a number of months.
According to KYW, Rohana will enter a guilty plea to the interstate trafficking charge, which carries a maximum term of two years in jail and a fine of $20,000. The federal charges —theft and concealment of a cultural heritage artifact from a museum— will be dismissed. They could have led to an up to 30-year jail sentence.
Charging documents state that events took place at the museum’s alcohol-laden, after-hours holiday party. Rohana entered the closed and roped-off terra cotta warrior exhibit. He allegedly wrapped his arm around the sculpture of the “Cavalryman,” took a selfie with it, then snapped off its thumb and tucked it away in his pocket.
The ten sculptures on display were appraised at $4.5 million, with the thumb being worth about $5,000.
When the museum learned the thumb was gone in January 2018, the FBI opened an inquiry. When an FBI agent questioned Rohana at his residence, according to the investigators, Rohana turned over the thumb.
The City Council adopted a resolution expressing regret to China for the harm caused after the Chinese government encouraged the United States to impose a severe penalty for the incident.
Rohana admitted to making an error while intoxicated when he first faced the allegations in an April 2019 trial. The jury couldn’t agree, so the judge declared a mistrial. The charges brought against Rohana, according to his legal representatives, were for serious art thefts, not “youthful vandalism.”
