Missing fossils found at home, office of former Mace Brown museum researcher

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - Rare fossils worth thousands of dollars were recovered from the home, new employer and storage building of a former College of Charleston employee after going missing.

Mace Brown Natural History Museum Curator Dr. Scott Persons contacted campus public safety on March 7 to report a rare dolphin jaw and teeth fossil had been removed by a former employee improperly. The fossil was valued at around $2,500.

The police report states the fossil was taken by former employee Robert Bossenecker and his wife, Sarah, who was serving as the museum’s collection manager and returned to the original donor.

A witness said she had helped Bossenecker move “office supplies” from his office in August 2023 when he asked her to store them for him.

Later, the report states, Bossenecker bragged about taking fossils from the museum leading to the witness realizing what she was storing and arranging for the fossils to be returned to the museum.

Persons reported another rare fossil and a 3D-printed whale skull were also missing.

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A witness would say they saw the whale skull in Bossenecker’s home in November 2023, some months after his employment and later the skull would appear in a photo with him and his wife on the website for Coastal Center for Paleontology, the report states.

Subsequent search warrants were served at the Bossenecker home and Coastal Center for Paleontology and returned thousands of dollars worth of fossils and hundreds of museum records, the report states.

Items included an Amazon box addressed to Sarah Bossenecker filled with petrified wood that was labeled “definitely not stolen mineral samples.”

The estimated value of the items recovered from both locations was listed at $8,634.

Detectives were contacted Tuesday by a senior paleontologist from the National Parks Service about another fossil that had been sent to the museum.

No records were found for the fossil that was described as a new, unnamed species however investigators recognized the fossil as one stored in a POD storage unit during warrant service. The fossil had been left behind since it was not a known museum piece at the time, the report states.

Officers located the pod and recovered the fossil before the pod was sent to California.

While at the College of Charleston, Bossenecker authored research on the evolution of baleen whales. The toothed whales lived along the South Carolina coast about 30 million years ago.

Bossenecker is considered a marine mammal paleontology expert.

It’s unclear if Bossenecker is facing any charges concerning the recovered fossils.