ROME, ITALY—Reuters reports that Italian police seized more than 2,000 artifacts, including vases, coins, and building fragments, in a sweep intended to dismantle a criminal gang dealing in looted antiquities throughout southern Italy. Some 550 artifacts alone were recovered from a house that had been turned into a private museum. The investigation, which led to the arrest of three people, was initiated last year after the theft of part of a fresco of Apollo and Artemis from the House of Neptune in Pompeii. Police also seized metal detectors and other items said to have been used in illegal digs. Police did not say if the missing fresco fragment has been found. To read more about looting of artifacts in Italy, see "Raiding the Tomb Raiders."
