PA Bill Number: HB458
Title: In post-trial matters, further providing for eligibility for relief, providing for postconviction review for veterans with service-connected mental ...
Description: In post-trial matters, further providing for eligibility for relief, providing for postconviction review for veterans with service-connected mental ...
Last Action: Third consideration and final passage (102-101)
Last Action Date: Dec 16, 2025
As Criminal Laws Proliferate, More Are Ensnared :: 07/26/2011
Eddie Leroy Anderson of Craigmont, Idaho, is a retired logger, a former science teacher and now a federal criminal thanks to his arrowhead-collecting hobby.
In 2009, Mr. Anderson loaned his son some tools to dig for arrowheads near a favorite campground of theirs. Unfortunately, they were on federal land. Authorities "notified me to get a lawyer and a damn good one," Mr. Anderson recalls.
There is no evidence the Andersons intended to break the law, or even knew the law existed, according to court records and interviews. But the law, the Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979, doesn't require criminal intent and makes it a felony punishable by up to two years in prison to attempt to take artifacts off federal land without a permit.
