Feb. 6 (Bloomberg) -- A U.S. Army warrant officer was arrested in Alabama and charged with selling dozens of artifacts, dating to 3000 BC or earlier, that were stolen from Egypt's Ma'adi Museum five years ago.

Edward George Johnson, a chief warrant officer who commanded attack and scout helicopters, will appear today in an Alabama federal court after prosecutors in Manhattan charged him with theft. Johnson, arrested yesterday, sold the artifacts to an unnamed art dealer who says he's a Sotheby's.com associate, prosecutors say.

``The art dealer ultimately consigned the pieces of the collection to galleries and/or collectors in Manhattan, London, Zurich and Montreal,'' according to a complaint unsealed today in Manhattan federal court. The art dealer isn't charged.

In September 2002, about 370 artifacts excavated in Egypt in the 1920s and 1930s were stolen from the Ma'adi Museum outside Cairo, the complaint says. From February to October 2002, Johnson, also known as ``Dutch,'' was deployed to Cairo, prosecutors say.

According to the complaint, the art dealer, then in Texas and now in Washington, was contacted by Johnson in January 2003. Johnson, now 44, claimed the artifacts had been passed down from his grandfather, who got them while working for a mineral company in Egypt in the 1930s or 1940s, the complaint said.

No Documentation

The dealer paid $21,200 for 90 artifacts, though Johnson had no documentation to support their provenance, the complaint says. Prosecutors have since recovered about 80 pieces, which had been consigned to various collections. Most were from the lot stolen in Cairo, prosecutors say.

Johnson's lawyer, Christine Freeman, didn't immediately return a call seeking comment.

Johnson lives in Fayetteville, North Carolina. He faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted on the stolen property charge and five years for wire fraud. A warrant officer is intermediate in rank between a noncommissioned officer and a commissioned officer.

A spokesperson for Sotheby's, the world's largest publicly traded auction house, didn't immediately return a call. The dealer tried to market the collection in 2005 through rival Christie's International, according to the complaint.

The case is U.S. v. Johnson, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

To contact the reporter on this story: David Glovin in Manhattan federal court at dglovin@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: February 6, 2008 17:43 EST