The Bahia Emerald, a legendary gemstone is shrouded in mystery and controversy. Discovered in Brazil, this massive emerald has sparked legal battles, ownership disputes, and tales of a curse that haunts those who possess it.
In 2001, miners in Bahia, Brazil, discovered one of the world’s largest emerald clusters in the Carnaíba mining district of the state of Bahia. Brazilian stones are typically cloudy appearance, but the emeralds found in Carnaíba are also huge, with the Bahia Emerald being the most astonishing example. It weighs 840 pounds with an estimated value of $925 million.
Photo by Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department
The emerald had quite the adventure getting out of Brazil. It was carried by mules, but they were attacked by panthers, so some guys had to carry it out on a home-made stretcher. Then it was sold for a measly $8,000 to two gem hunters who took it to São Paulo. It was almost lost in a flood on the way there, and ended up sitting in a garage for years.
n 2005, the gem was shipped to a mining entrepreneur in California who knew the original miners. He shipped the stone to New Orleans so a prospective buyer could see it. Hurricane Katrina struck two weeks later, leaving the storage vault and the Bahia Emerald under 16 feet of water. After fishing it out, the entrepreneur somehow lost possession of the gem and it ended up in the hands of another California investor.
After Katrina, the emerald was allegedly used as collateral for some diamonds. The owner of the diamonds claimed he had been kidnapped by the Brazilian mafia, held hostage in an RV, and driven around Nevada for two weeks!
The stone eventually came into the hands of an investor who stored it in a vault in Los Angeles. It was stolen from the Los Angeles vault. Law enforcement then tracked the emerald to a Las Vegas vault. Since ownership of the gem was in question, the L.A. sheriff’s department confiscated it in 2008. For more than a decade, individuals and corporations tried in court to prove they were the rightful owners of the stone. Meanwhile, the Brazilian government took action in U.S. federal court to repatriate the gemstone. National Geographic Channel aired an hour-long documentary about the emerald in January of 2012.
In 2017, the Brazil convicted two Brazilian residents of illegally smuggling the emerald into the U.S. using fake documents. After the two men lost an appeal in 2021, Brazil issued an order to seize the Bahia Emerald. In November 2024, a U.S. court determined the government of Brazil owns the stone, paving the way to return it to Brazil.