Gold from 18th Century Shipwreck Linked to Cape Verde in International Police Case
A case of illegal trafficking in gold bars taken from a French shipwreck in the 18th century involves a possible connection with Cape Verde. A French citizen claimed to have found the gold while diving in the waters of the archipelago, but French authorities dispute this version and point to another location and suspects already investigated in Europe.
The alleged involvement of Cape Verde in an international gold smuggling scandal is once again at the center of a decades-old controversy. The French authorities are contesting an allegation made by French citizen Annette May Pesty, 78, who claimed to have found bars of gold diving in the waters of the Cape Verde archipelago.
The declaration was made in 1999, on the Antiques Roadshow, when Pesty revealed that he possessed the ingots, which later proved to belong to the treasure of the French ship Le Prince de Conty, sunk in 1746 off the coast of Britain. However, investigations conducted by French underwater archaeologists indicate that the origin of the gold is not related to Cape Verde, but to the site of the shipwreck near the French island of Belle-Île-en-Mer.
The case took a new turn in 2018 when archaeologist Michel L'Hour identified five gold bars for sale on a US auction site. Investigations led to the hands of American writer Gay Courter, 80, and her husband Philip Courter, 82, who claimed to have received the ingots as a gift from Pesty and her now deceased partner.
While Pesty has maintained his version linked to dives in Cape Verde, the authorities believe that the real person responsible for extracting the 16 gold bars between 1976 and 1999 was his brother-in-law, underwater photographer Yves Gladu. Gladu confessed to having made dozens of dives at the site of the wreck and sold all the gold to a Swiss military officer in 2006, denying any connection with the Courters.
Even so, the American couple ended up selling 18 gold bars for more than 192,000 dollars, mainly over the internet. Both were arrested in the UK in 2022 and are currently facing formal charges in France for receiving stolen goods and illegal trafficking in historical artifacts.
The case, which is due to go to trial in 2026, raises questions about the illegal circulation of historical goods and the use of alternative narratives - such as the alleged connection with Cape Verde - to try to justify the possession of looted objects.
The Courters' defense claims that the couple "were unaware of the illicit origin of the gold" and that "they only wanted to help a French friend". The alleged connection with diving in Cape Verde, on the other hand, seems to have served only as a distraction in a more complex and long-standing case.
