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Space Science

Museum Director Indicted for Stealing NASA Artifacts 178

Posted by timothy from the life-imitates-monk dept.
NBrooke271 writes "Max Ary, former Director of the Kansas Cosmosphere, has been hit with an eleven-count federal indictment, charging that he sold NASA space artifacts on loan to the museum, including an astronaut's in-flight T-shirt, a control panel from Air Force One and an Apollo 12 water valve for a personal profit of around $180,000. 'Mr. Ary, on behalf of the Cosmosphere, continued to sign documents reporting and verifying to NASA that the watch was still in its possession and collection,' said U.S. Attorney Eric Melgren. Ary currently serves as the Executive Director of Omniplex Science Museum in Oklahoma City, where he has taken a leave of absence. Read official statements from the Cosmosphere, the Omniplex, and Ary's attorney regarding the indictment."
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Museum Director Indicted for Stealing NASA Artifacts More

Museum Director Indicted for Stealing NASA Artifacts

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  • Watch? (Score:5, Informative)

    by ackthpt ( 218170 ) * on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:01PM (#12202879) Homepage Journal
    'Mr. Ary, on behalf of the Cosmosphere, continued to sign documents reporting and verifying to NASA that the watch was still in its possession and collection,' said U.S. Attorney Eric Melgren.

    What 'watch'?

    The NASA Omega Mock-up Watch 38. Sometime prior to January of 2000, the exact date being unknown to the Grand Jury, the Cosmosphere loaned several artifacts to a space exhibit in the Philippines. The Cosmosphere became aware that some of these items were lost or damaged when some of the items were returned on or about April 1998. The items loaned to the Philippine exhibit included: a Shuttle In-flight garment, a Russian Soyuz Space Suit, American Space Food (five packages), an Apollo Liquid Cooling garment, a Beta cloth stowage bag, an Omega 17

    mock-up watch, an astronaut ink pen, a Gemini spacesuit, an Apollo In-flight garment. 39. The Omega astronaut watch was a mock-up watch that the Cosmosphere had received pursuant to an exhibit loan agreement from NASA.

    Sounds more like mismanagement, if it was still reported as present, yet missing or damaged.

    Though a href="http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/ks/press/apr2005/a pril7a.html">this looks pretty damning and has more of the detail.

    • Link to DoJ charges [usdoj.gov]

      I'd personally like to thank the people who made sure the keyboard loses USB focus (or whatever it is) every few seconds and drops keystrokes.

      • Re:A properly embedded link.. sigh. (Score:5, Funny)

        by TheViffer ( 128272 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:18PM (#12203113)

        A nose cone.
        A NASA silk screen
        A photographic spot meter
        An RX3 spacesuit component.
        Apollo 8 silk screens.
        An Apollo 11 silk screen.
        An Apollo13 bus bar battery cable that had been flown in space.
        A sextant crown assembly that had been flown in space.
        An in-flight crew shirt.
        An Air Force One control panel.
        A Noun 70 Code panel, loaned to the Cosmosphere by NASA that had been flow in space. It sold for $3,400. On April 4, 2001, Ary signed a report to NASA falsely stating the panel was still in the museum's collection.
        An Apollo 12 water shut-off valve that had been flown in space.
        A rotation controller.
        A purge valve for a spacesuit.
        A film canister.

        Makes me want to go buy an airplane/auto salvage yard and Ebay off parts as "possible relics of the Soviet space program" which "may possibly" have crash landed in Bumfluck, Nebraska.

        "No, No sir, that's not a hub cap from a 1971 Duster, thats the nose to Sputnik!"
        • Makes me want to go buy an airplane/auto salvage yard and Ebay off parts as "possible relics of the Soviet space program" which "may possibly" have crash landed in Bumfluck, Nebraska.

          How about that guy in Florida, years ago (IIRC) who found a depleted uranium nose cone in his junk yard. He thought it made neat sparks when he hit it with a screw driver.

          Be the govt would go ape-sh!t if something like that moved through the mail.

          Mr Beasely: "Your package sure is heavy, Dagwood, what's in it?"
          Dagwood: "Ab

          • No they wouldn't. They are too busy claiming that DU dust is completely harmless, even when inhaled. They can't possible make any sort of fuss over some large piece of DU without revealing that they are perfectly aware of the dangers of radioactive heavy metals :D
    • What 'watch'

      The one in the last sentence of that excerpt you pasted.

      • The one in the last sentence of that excerpt you pasted.

        That's why I pasted it. It wasn't mentioned except in passing in the post and wasn't in any of the immediate links, so I went digging for information on it -- which led me to the DoJ site, which would have been better linked to the post.

    • Re:Watch? (Score:4, Funny)

      by 14erCleaner ( 745600 ) <FourteenerCleaner@yahoo.com> on Monday April 11, 2005 @02:04PM (#12203776) Homepage Journal
      an Omega 17 mock-up watch

      Thank god he didn't sell off the Omega 13 [imdb.com]!

  • Conversion? (Score:4, Funny)

    by tektek ( 829733 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:01PM (#12202885) Homepage
    How much is that in $2 bills?

  • I used to work for this guy (Score:5, Informative)

    by NBrooke271 ( 260498 ) <Nick.Brooke@g[ ]l.com ['mai' in gap]> on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:05PM (#12202934) Homepage
    Submitter here. Incidentally, I used to work at the Omniplex when Mr. Ary was in charge. We were very excited when he came to the museum; we had heard that he practically built the Cosmosphere with his bare hands. He pioneered the Smithsonian Affiliate program, one of the best ways for museums to get their hands on great government collections. This indictment has come as a shock to everyone.

  • Hey! (Score:5, Funny)

    by ShaniaTwain ( 197446 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:05PM (#12202936) Homepage
    drop the Apollo 12 water valve and step away from the car!

  • Shouldn't be hard to get it back (Score:5, Funny)

    by pr0t0 ( 216378 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:05PM (#12202937)


    I heard that NORAD tracks all kinds of space junk.

  • More information (Score:5, Informative)

    by TripMaster Monkey ( 862126 ) * on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:05PM (#12202938)
    In the interest of promoting more enlightened discussion, the news release from the DOJ regarding this case can be found here [usdoj.gov].

    • Re:More information (Score:2, Informative)

      by DikSeaCup ( 767041 )
      "enlightened discussion"

      You must be new here.

      Considering the number of folks that don't even bother to click on the hyperlinks provided by the Slashdot listing itself (IOW RTFA), the number of folks that will follow yours will be considerably diminished.

      Honestly, thanks though - I followed a link to the DOJ site but it went to a front page, and not the specific article of interest.

  • How do stupid people get such jobs? I mean, the guy sells NASA stuff, then keeps signing papers that say he still has them. Didn't he wonder if someday NASA might want their stuff back, and when they found out it was gone, who they would look to first?

    • Re:ANother moron as a director.... (Score:4, Funny)

      by op12 ( 830015 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:36PM (#12203356) Homepage
      Seriously, anyone who has seen any movies knows you have to replace the things you took with elaborate replicas or holograms.

      • Re:ANother moron as a director.... (Score:4, Funny)

        by identity0 ( 77976 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @02:19PM (#12203993) Journal
        Ooh, I can imagine some intrepid Indiana Jones type going up to the altar of the bottle of tang, and very quickly and carefully replacing it with a bottle of Evian.

        Then he hears an ominous rumbling, and looks up to see a very rotund 800 pound NASA engineer who has been living on nothing but Cheetos and tang rolling towards him, yelling "My Taaang! Bring back my Taaaaaanngg!".

        A chase scene between shelves of old NASA junk ensues.
    • Didn't he wonder if someday NASA might want their stuff back, and when they found out it was gone, who they would look to first?

      Sounds like a typical addict. Never thinking about tomorrow, just thinking about his next fix.

      Looking at the guy, I'm guessing some kind of sexual addiction requiring the services of high-priced prostitutes, or maybe gambling.

    • Re:ANother moron as a director.... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Keep in mind, it's only the stupid ones who get sensationalized press coverage. The 99 other directors who do a satisfactory job are never mentioned in headlines like: "Museum Director Continues to do a Good Job!"

      And no matter the position, no matter how much research is done, eventually one hires someone who's not right for the job or changes after being hired. Mistakes happen, people change. The best way to prevent major incidents is to have a system of checks and balances to catch any wrongdoings at the

    • Max was anything but a moron. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by wowbagger ( 69688 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:50PM (#12203553) Homepage Journal
      How Max got the job at the Cosmosphere is simple.

      He built the place. It started out as a planetarium at a state fair, and Max (and Patty Carey) worked their asses off to make it one of the leading space museums in the world.

      He is ANYTHING but a moron. He was one of the cageiest individuals around. He spent years combing junkyards in Florida, Huston, and Huntsville, finding gear that NASA had thown away when the program it was associated with was no longer funded.

      He found the best people to restore the artifacts, and built a museum collection that was the envy of other space museums.

      Before you spout off on the subject (and moderators, before you moderate this tripe as insightful) you might want to actually do some research on the history of the Cosmosphere.

      All of that makes this EVEN WORSE - Max could have just as easily continued to do as he had done, locating artifacts in junkheaps, having Spaceworks (the artifact restoration arm of the Cosmosphere) restore them, and legally sell them. He didn't have to do this!

      And if he did indeed misappropriate artifacts (and while it sure looks that way, do remember - he has not yet been convicted in a court of law), then that was not merely a carrer-limiting move, that was a carrer-ending move - no museum will ever touch him again.

      • Wait. He stole stuff, from a place he built, when he didn't have to. And how does this not qualify him for moron status?
        • But does not indictment means you are accused, and now it is the job of the prosecutor to proove the accusation : aka he is not yet judged ? If this is right then you have no ground of putting a statement like "he stole" or "he is a moron". Reserve your judgement until the end of the prosecution. And moderator, how can you moderate the parent post as insightful ? the guy has only been charged, not yet judged ! Is innocent until proven guilty only empty words in the US ??
      • If the place was in the business of selling off relics it no longer wanted to display, it could be a bookkeeping error. A big one, granted, but with a collection that size someone may have overlooked that these dozen or so items weren't owned by them and sold some off.
        • When you sign a document stating that something's in your possession, you verify that first by actually physically making sure you still have it. If you do not, you are liable for making a false statement because it was your responsibility to ensure that you were affixing your signature to a true statement. A lot of papers like that do state "Under penalty of perjury, I state that..." so yes, you are legally responsible for making sure the statement on the document is true.
          • I'm not implying he isn't legally liable and responsible for the missing items. In fact, I'll be interested to see what evidence comes out under trial. It is fairly common practice, regardless of how dumb it is, to sign papers like that without actually verifying whether they're actually in posession. Note, first, that he hasn't been convicted. To date he's acted responsibly and this seems out of character. There are two possibilities here. The first is that he's a dishonest member of the top level of
            • The space.com version of this story (where I originally heard about this) goes on to say:

              Disclosure: collectSPACE Editor Robert Pearlman is among the collectors who unknowingly purchased items stolen from the Cosmosphere. In response to a request by NASA, he has surrendered the artifact - an Apollo spacesuit strap-on pocket - to NASA's Inspector General.

              If the items are showing up in the hands of other people, who know where they got them from (if you're a serious collector, you keep records) then there's

    • Re:ANother moron as a director.... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Dun Malg ( 230075 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @02:43PM (#12204287) Homepage
      How do stupid people get such jobs? I mean, the guy sells NASA stuff, then keeps signing papers that say he still has them. Didn't he wonder if someday NASA might want their stuff back, and when they found out it was gone, who they would look to first?

      People do all sorts of stupid crap like that. Probably because 95% of the time, you can get away with fooling the government. There are certain things, though, that you just can't cover up. Like those interns at NASA-Houston who stole a safe containing moon rocks which they then tried to sell on eBay. When it comes to unusual items, particularly stuff from the space program, they keep a pretty good accounting of it all and they almost certainly will catch you eventually. Stealing and trying to sell moon rocks is, of course, DOUBLY stupid because virtually all terrestrial moon rocks are property of the US government and never for sale...

  • Intresting trades considered... (Score:3, Funny)

    by grumling ( 94709 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:13PM (#12203061) Homepage
    including an astronaut's in-flight T-shirt

    I wonder what kind of van you could trade for that?

  • "Hmm" (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:13PM (#12203065)
    Museum personel always felt something was Ary...
  • Anyone got a URL for the ebay-auction of that stuff?

  • Have I missed something? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:18PM (#12203118)
    1 - The prosecuters contend that Ary sold items and a figure of $180,000 is mentioned.

    2 - Ary's lawyer mentions tens of thousands of items. The defense will be that he is at most guilty of careless management.

    I have trouble putting 1 and 2 together. Presumably the prosecutors have disclosed their evidence to the defense. Do they have evidence that Ary sold anything to anyone? I think if they had any real evidence of that sort that Ary would quietly plead guilty and try for a reduced sentence. This has the smell of a case where all the evidence is circustantial.

    I'm sure not calling this guy guilty without seeing a lot more evidence.

  • This is disgusting (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jessecurry ( 820286 ) <jesse@jessecurry.net> on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:20PM (#12203138) Homepage Journal
    I am about to read the article, but I find this to be a horrible offense. Our national treasures are here for the entire population to enjoy. Anytime I hear about someone stealing or selling items of this type I am appalled. I can't believe that people can be so motivated my money. And it's only $180,000 that's not even that much.
    • Not that much? You saying $180,000 for a t-shirt is cheap? You obviously haven't been to Wal-Mart.
    • You think that a control panel for Air Force One, a mock watch, a pen and a couple of t-shirts are our National Treasures? As opposed to things, like say, the Declaration of Independence. The Constitution. Bill of Rights... But then, somehow, am not surprised given the common attitutes which have become prevelant in our country.
      • any of the items that played a part in the history of our nation become national treasures. Perhaps these don't have the same importance of the bill or rights, but they are pieces of the history of our technological achievement. Like it or not, many Americans draw a great deal of pride from the technological feats that America was able to accomplish before anyone else, they use it as a measure of how great the nation is. The ideals that our nation is built on are wonderful, but now success is measured in wh
        • Like our ability to run our government without deficit spending. Or to have a social medicine program for all. Maybe to fund college for anyone that wants to go. Or anything else that would benefit society as a whole.

          We'd rather let grandmothers die by not receiving meds/medical care than have socialized medicine. But hey, we did get to the fucking moon first (allegedly). Smartest richest country in the world that can only seem to cut taxes for the wealthy. Sounds like Utopia to me.
          • How does funding college for anyone who wants to go bebefit society? Funding college for those who would contribute more to society than the cost to society - that I can see. But how to know who to fund? Perhaps we should instead *loan* people the money to go to college, and thereby move the risk to the individual - harder for him, better for society. Oh, wait, we already do that.

            Don't confuse programs that make life easier in the short term with programs that are actually beneficial to society over t
            • Are you kidding me? You think the public education system doesn't benefit society as a whole?

              I guess you'd rather hire a person who cannot read or write to be your secretary. How about your tech support staff, why would they need any education. Software Engineers don't need school either. I guess reading Programming for Dummies should be enough.

              The more educated a society is the more everyone benefits by having better people to hire and keeping a nation ahead of the intellectual curve (which we are fallin
              • Are things so bad now in our public education system that people don't get any eductaion, even basic literacy, until college?

                Certainly mandatory public education is valuable to establish a baseline minimum education (and we've been doing a poor job at that, it seems). However, it's still not the case that the majority of jobs require a college education. I don't know a *single* person who's using what they learned in college in the workplace today.

                I know way too many people who partied their way through
    • "Hey Fred, wasn't the Spirit of St Louis hanging up there before?"

      "Ahhhh, I think it is out at the cleaners."

      By the way, if anyone approaches you in a parking lot with a genuine V2 rocket in the back of their van it is ok to be suspicious.

  • Seinfeld (Score:2, Funny)

    by Reignking ( 832642 )
    Is this how Seinfeld got the astronaut's pen that writes upside-down?
    • Nope, that's the Fisher Space Pen [fisherspacepen.com]. Quite a nice design, highly recommended -- unless they get hot. Nice that they come with a cap.

  • Innocent until proven guilty? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Bnderan ( 801928 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:20PM (#12203149)
    An indictment not being a conviction, most news organizations would try and work the word "allegedly" into such a report as this one. But It seems /. is exempt from that kind of responsibility. eh ... Fuck it ... let's hang him!

  • what a waste (Score:4, Interesting)

    by CompMD ( 522020 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:21PM (#12203156)
    The Cosmosphere is one of my favorite museums. For the midwest, there is no better air and space museum. Aerospace technology and innovation is huge in Kansas, but there are a lot of people around here that can't go the the Smithsonian in DC or the EAA museum in Wisconsin. I would be very disheartened to learn that the allegations against Mr. Ary are true. The collection at the Cosmosphere is fantastic, and I hope there isn't any other fallout from this.
    • I hope there isn't any other fallout from this

      Well, I suppose they could turn it into the Kansas Museum Of They're-Only-Theories [npr.org].

      I think it's great, actually, that there's a tech/aerospace-centric museum in Kansas (its current curatorial difficulties notwithstanding), but I guess I'm finding that spark of interest in applied science hard to square with the whole retro-dark-ages-religiosity thing. Especially in a state that makes a living off of living things (advanced crops) that didn't exist even a f
    • You forget the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson in Dayton Ohio. Wonderful place. They have the only remaining XB-70 Valkyrie there! HUGE and amazing airplane. As well as thousands of other exhibits.
  • I read the article, and while part of me says "he should be thrown in jail for stealing stuff", another part of me says "so what" because the items for sold can never really be touched/felt by Joe Q. Public.

    Ayn Rand had it right when she said that the key thing about "public" property is that its definately not "public". You cant alter it, improve it, use it.
    • At least we were able to see it. Not now that it's been stolen..
    • You cant alter it, improve it, use it.

      Do you think the private collectors who probably bought this are going to alter, improve or use it? No, it'll be in a glass case that only one guy can look at, instead of tens of thousands of people.

      I think precisely the opposite, private (i.e. for personal use only) collections of objects of this sort should not be allowed or at least be discouraged (unless the object in question is of secondary importance), because the guy who really wants to see these objects ofte

    • Re:In a small way - who cares (Score:4, Insightful)

      by LWATCDR ( 28044 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:58PM (#12203702) Homepage Journal
      Ayn Rand was as big of an idiot as Marx was. They where both clueless.
      "thing about "public" property is that its definitely not "public". You cant alter it, improve it, use it."
      Really? I go and use mountain bike trails at a local park that a club built. That is "Public" land. Do you not use your streets? Public property also. Never go to a park or a beach? Never helped to pick up trash at a park or beach? Helped to build a playground. Here are a few concrete examples of people using, altering ,and improving public property. So here are also concrete examples that the statement is wrong.
    • Ayn Rand had it right when she said that the key thing about "public" property is that its definately not "public". You cant alter it, improve it, use it.

      You're a moron. If I didn't have 200 friends already, I'd foe you. Just wanted you to know.

      BTW, I rode a bus to work today. Does that prove you wrong?

  • I'll be rich, and quick! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Kimos ( 859729 ) <kimos...slashdot@@@gmail...com> on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:26PM (#12203225) Homepage
    It's surprising how much some people will pay for a tap. A tap! I should go buy some water valves, scratch off the brand name and write NASA on it with a marker. The only thing more reliable than a get-rich-quick scheme, is the stupidity of people.
    • The only thing more reliable than a get-rich-quick scheme, is the stupidity of people.

      I always prefered: "The only thing reliable as a get-rich-quick scheme, is the stupidity of people. " --- but that's gunna depend a whole lot on which side of the stupidity circle you're on, wouldn't it?

  • Geek Power corrupts, absolute Geek Power corrupts absolutly.

  • How to make money with space (Score:4, Funny)

    by rbanffy ( 584143 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:28PM (#12203251) Homepage Journal
    This is an example of how much money the private space industry can make. This guy made US$ 180,000 without even leaving the planet...

    Amazing

  • An even more pressing question... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mancat ( 831487 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:29PM (#12203256) Homepage
    Who the hell would buy this crap? $180,000 for this junk?

    Oh, I must have that water valve! Jeeves, fetch me my coat and have the Rolls Royce ready!
    • Who the hell would buy this crap? $180,000 for this junk?

      Somebody with $1,000,180,000 just lying about?

      I don't know, I'd certainly give the guy five bucks for a valve that was from an Apollo craft. Would make a nice paperweight. Five bucks is just about all the spare cash I have on hand. For other people (namely, those who are not wage slaves like me), well, they can afford to spend more on trinkets and conversation pieces.

  • What are they thinking? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jmoriarty ( 179788 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:33PM (#12203306)
    How are the brains wired in people who commit crimes like this? In an "honest" bank robbery, you are committing an obvious crime and only trying to conceal your identity. In fraud, you are creating a deliberate facade to hide what you are doing until you can safely vanish.

    To sell highly visible pieces of property that you do not own, then lie quite openly (with documentation!) that you still have them, seems to require being out of touch with reality. How can you not get found out?

    Do crimes like this indicate some mental issue, perhaps like kleptomania? I would be his driving force wasn't even the money, but some other compulsion or need.
    • Interesting how you arrived at a different conclusion than I. I thought of all the same points that you did, and arrived at the conclusion that he is probably not guilty. Not in a straightforward way, anyway.
    • If he is in fact guilty here are my thoughts on why he might have done this.

      This is all speculation, which in my opinion is the best kind of *lation. I've often found that while obseviving others and thinking back to some of my own actions people don't think much about the future. Maybe he just saw the opportunity to make a quick buck. Immediate gratification.

      Maybe after dealing with the bureaucracy so long he thought he could do it with out anyone really noticing. Many people often say how bad the system
    • I once heard of a case where some corparate admin and her husband figured they could write a company check of $2 million to themselves. The plan was that they would get the cheque signed, fly away to Brazil to start a new life, and by the time they reached the hotel, they would be millionaires.

      Unfortunately, they never managed to reached the airplane - they made the mistake of using the wrong color of cheque for the transaction.

  • Love the Cosmosphere (Score:5, Informative)

    by MrNiceguy_KS ( 800771 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:42PM (#12203447)
    If you've never been there, the Kansas Cosmosphere is an answer to anyone asking "Why the hell would I want to go to Kansas?" While it's not as big as the Air and Space Museum in DC, it has the largest collection of space artifacts in existance. You want to see Oddessey, the Apollo 13 command module? The gloves Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin wore on the moon? I was just there (again) this weekend and, had I not had my wife and daughter along, would have easily spent another 2 hours just walking through the museum. (by the way, the artifacts I mentioned are still there)

    They also have a planetarium and IMAX theater, but the museum is the real draw for me. It's a walkthrough the history of space exploration, from the early experiments of Goddard and Von Braun, to the German WW2 missle programs, the cold-war era space race, up through the Shuttle, ISS, and Space Ship One.

    The on-site restoration and replication studio does amazing work. They produced most of the props for the Apollo 13 movie. They later restored the Apollo 13 command module and the "Liberty Bell" Mercury module (which had sat on the ocean floor for decades) They received a retired SR-71 plane, and added on to the building to display it in the lobby.

    If you're anywhere near Hutchinson, Kansas, it's well worth driving out of your way to see.

  • Omniplex (Score:3, Interesting)

    by enforcer999 ( 733591 ) * on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:47PM (#12203508) Journal
    Hmm...now this makes me wonder about the true reasons why the Omniplex is in such mess [channeloklahoma.com].
    • Omniplex has been in a state of financial flux for some time now. Unfortunately, the politics involved in a non-profit museum are tremendous, and for years now the museum has been faltering due to a continues shuffle in the management deck. As a former employee, I can say that it's really a shame -- this museum used to be a world-class hands-on science museum patterned after the pioneering Exploratorium. However, the profit-driven boards of late have reduced the exhibit spaces to empty areas for occasion
      • Thanks for the information. I work a few miles from the Omniplex and have seen the quality of the selections deteriorate. I wondered about the air and space collection or lack there of.

        Well, I hope the Omniplex gets some needed help.

  • This guy is a jerk anyway (Score:4, Informative)

    by redshield3 ( 647661 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @01:59PM (#12203712)
    I worked at the Omniplex (the latest place this man was the director) over the summer, and had previously volunteered there for over four years.

    When he arrived at the museum he made a lot of sweeping changes without really consulting anyone. He fired most of the upper level people and replaced them with people he worked with in Kansas and I believe in Houston as well.

    His changes affected the character of the Omniplex in a detrimental way. The focus seemed to shift from educating people to making money. His management & leadership were piss-poor and had a negative effect on morale that trickled down to us lowly types who actually had to interact with visitors. Turnover was high all throughout the employee structure, and in the summer I worked there no less than 8 people were fired (the total staff is under 100).

    I hope that he is forced to leave and that his groupies he brought in leave too. Good riddance.

    • Sounds like you got way too caught up in the politics of the place for someone who was really just a volunteer/temp worker. Eight percent is really a low number of firings for a new management team; twenty to thirty percent would be more typical. You have to realize that there was a reason the board of directors brought him in, and it wasn't because everything was just hunky-dory before.

      I've watched the Cosmosphere's amazing growth from a small, community college planetarium to the premier exhibit of sp
      • It's not that a 'little temp worker' got caught up in the politics of the place. I care a lot about the Omniplex and I want to see it do well. My relationship with the museum and it's staff extends back about 15 years. I've watched the place take a pronounced nosedive since he took his position.

        These firings (from May to August of 2004) weren't related to any new management structure; these summer firings were people that actually do a lot of the work around the museum. Some of them had been there for ove

  • So stupid it might not be true (Score:3, Insightful)

    by deacon ( 40533 ) on Monday April 11, 2005 @02:34PM (#12204148) Journal
    I realize that most criminals are stupid, but this is just silly. This guy is accused of selling stuff from museum inventory, but then attesting that the items are still present.

    The items alledged to be sold are obviously very rare, some must be on-off pieces, and anything made for the govt. is going to have a serial # on it.

    A museum curator is going to have a record of each object, its serial #, description, photos, restoration record, provenance, etc. etc... That's what curators DO!

    So while it's fun to grab a pitchfork and torch and join the mob, let's step back a bit and see how the evidence plays out here.

  • How does someone think they can get away with something like that? This guys exemplifies the worst outcome of capitalism. He wanted money, he had a product (which wasn't his) and he found a buyer, and by god he was going to make a profit! I hope they lock him up in ass raping prison for a decade or two. Someone who thinks they should be able to make money any way they see fit is a dangerous person.
  • "Ary's attorney Lee Thompson said his client "intends to defend his innocence against any charge that he harmed the Cosmosphere or the federal space program."

    Umm.. the charge isn't that he harmed the Cosmosphere or the federal space program. The charge is that he took shit that wasn't his and sold it and kept the money... also known as THEFT.

    The issue is not whether he "harmed" one organization or the other.. the issue is that he broke the law.

    Ugh... there are still only 1000 of them at the bottom of the

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