Treasure hunter freed after decade in prison for not revealing location of gold | US news
A US treasure hunter who was sentenced to 10 years in prison after refusing to reveal the location of missing gold coins has apparently been released from prison before authorities could find out where the gold was.
Famous rescuer Tommy Thompson, who found the long-lost ship called the Golden Ship near South Carolina in 1998, was released from federal prison on March 4, according to recently released records and reports.
CBS News said the ship sailed under the name SS Central America before Thompson, now 73, found it with tons of “sunken treasure.” in question.
The SS Central America was carrying more than 400 passengers and crew, as well as 30,000 lb of federal gold, when it sank in 1857. Thompson and his crew found the ship at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, about 7,000 ft below the surface, CBS News reported.
Investors who financed Thompson’s search for the ship later claimed he had taken their share of the treasure and sued him in 2005.
Thompson insisted that he did not know the specific whereabouts of the 500 coins made from the bottom of the ship. He was “secluded” in Florida and deemed a fugitive when an Ohio federal judge issued a warrant for his arrest for skipping a court date, CBS News reported.
Authorities found Thompson three years later living under an assumed name in a Florida hotel. The judge reportedly humiliated Thompson and sent him to prison after he refused to answer questions about the whereabouts of the coins.
Thompson has repeatedly claimed that $2.5 million in coins was given to a Belize-based foundation and that the $50 million from the sale of the first gold set was largely paid for bank loans and legal fees.
Although federal law generally limits prison sentences for contempt to 18 months, U.S. appeals judges ruled in 2019 that Thompson’s case was an exception. They found that Thompson’s refusal violated his plea agreement.
In another request for release in 2020, Thompson reportedly told the judge: “Your Honor, I don’t know if we’ve been down this road before, but I don’t know where the gold is.” He also said: “I feel like I don’t have the keys to my freedom.”
The investors’ lawsuit against Thompson was dismissed in 2018. More recently, as CBS News noted, a judge decided to vacate Thompson’s contempt sentence more than a year before his release, finding that he no longer believed keeping him behind bars would provide information on the whereabouts of the gold.
Thompson was later ordered to begin serving a two-year prison sentence for missing court proceedings in 2012, and he was released after completing that sentence.
