FRANKFORT, Ky. — A Kentucky grand jury indicted an Ohio historian Thursday for leading efforts to pull an 8-ton boulder known as Indian Head Rock from the Ohio River.
The indictment accuses Steve Shaffer of breaking Kentucky law by removing a protected archaeological object, a felony. He could face one to five years in prison.
The rock’s removal triggered a dispute between Shaffer and elected officials in Kentucky who insist it belongs in their state. Shaffer says he saved it from being damaged or lost forever. It now sits in a city garage in Portsmouth, Ohio.
The rock was once a navigation marker and an attraction for locals who ventured out to carve their names into it, but it hadn’t been seen since the 1920s. In September, Shaffer led the crew that pulled it from the river.
