Gold and Diamonds Buried? The Fate of the Explorer Who Dug Up Treasures in the Rocky Mountains National Park

Rodrick Dow Krayson desecrated the Fort Yellowstone Cemetery in search of the 'Treasure of the Rocky Mountains.' Photo by Yonhap News

[Asia Economy Reporter Hana Na] CNN reported on the 9th (local time) that an explorer who dug up a cemetery within a national park in the United States to find the "Treasure of the Rocky Mountains" was caught by authorities.

Rodrick Dow Creason (52) from Utah was handed over to the prosecution on charges of illegally excavating national assets and arbitrarily moving archaeological resources.

According to the U.S. federal prosecution, Creason explored various parts of Yellowstone National Park from October 2019 to May last year. This was to find the treasure hidden by antique collector Forest Penn (90) over 10 years ago.

Earlier, Penn revealed a 24-line poem containing hints about the location of a box containing treasures worth about $1 million (approximately 1.1 billion KRW), including gold, rubies, emeralds, and diamonds, buried somewhere in the Rocky Mountains in his 2010 autobiography.

Creason dug up graves in the Fort Yellowstone Cemetery to find this treasure. This cemetery is the resting place of soldiers and their families who died between 1888 and 1957.

The prosecution stated that if Creason is found guilty of damaging national assets by digging up the cemetery, he could face up to 12 years in prison.

The sentencing for Creason is scheduled for March 17.

Meanwhile, the treasure hidden by Penn, called the "Treasure of the Rocky Mountains," attracted 350,000 explorers worldwide, and two of them lost their lives while wandering the wilderness park.

Penn explained that he devised the "treasure hunt" after the 2008 global financial crisis to inspire and give hope to people to explore nature.

Meanwhile, the treasure hunt ended when a 32-year-old medical student from Michigan discovered it. In June last year, Penn announced on his personal website that a man had found the treasure box he had buried, saying, "The adventure is over."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.