I was also a victim of the Curse of Pompeii! I’m divorced. AND got breast cancer, just like the mysterious woman who returned stolen stones (and I returned mine too)

An American tourist who stole pumice stones from Pompeii has revealed she was divorced and diagnosed with breast cancer, claiming she is yet another victim of the ancient city’s ‘curse’.

Deb, from Pennsylvania, said she went to Pompeii while on holiday in southern Italy in 2011 and picked up two stones from the archaeological site.

But Deb said that within eight years of returning home, she was divorced and diagnosed with breast cancer – just like the mystery woman who this month returned three pumice stones she stole from Pompeii, along with a groveling letter.

Deb revealed that she too had returned the stones in 2020 – a year after her stage 3 breast cancer diagnosis – after watching a TV drama about a cursed doll that reminded her of the stones she had taken nine years earlier.

‘When I returned from Italy not long after, I went through a divorce and a year later I was diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer,’ Deb tells MailOnline. ‘One day I was watching a TV program about a cursed doll and I started thinking about the stones I had taken with me.’

In the envelope containing the stolen stones, Deb said she wrote a letter saying she was sorry for taking the stones and that she intended to be disrespectful.

‘I haven’t heard from anyone, but I’ve since put it out of my mind, hoping the curse was broken after I returned the stones,’ Deb told MailOnline.

And in the five years since, she said she’s undergone a double mastectomy in addition to chemotherapy. “Things are getting better, it seems like I’m in a good place now. I’ll go five years without any problems, thank God,” Deb said.

Deb’s case is very similar to that of a mysterious tourist who also stole pumice stones earlier this month and returned the artifacts after she too was diagnosed with breast cancer.

The woman, who did not give her name, sent a package containing three small stones and a letter written in English saying she was “unaware of the curse” of Pompeii when she stole the artifacts.

In the letter, the young tourist said that within a year of her visit to Pompeii, she had been diagnosed with breast cancer.

‘I didn’t know about the curse. “I didn’t know I wasn’t allowed to take rocks,” the woman wrote. ‘Within a year I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I am a young and healthy woman and the doctors said it was ‘just bad luck.’

“Please accept my apology and these pieces,” the tourist added, before signing off the letter with “I’m sorry” in Italian.

Deb said she was “shocked” to read about the young tourist’s ordeal and how similar it was to what happened to her.

Pompeii was destroyed after Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD.

Gabriel Zuchtriegel, the director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park, shared a photo of the young tourist’s letter and the returned artifacts on Good luck for your future.’

Deb and the mystery woman aren’t the only tourists returning artifacts they stole from Pompeii, citing a “curse” as the reason.

In 2020, a Canadian woman, identified only as Nicole, sent a package containing two mosaic tiles, parts of an amphora and a piece of ceramics she stole from Pompeii to a travel agency in the Italian city.

Nicole, who stole the artifacts in 2005, said she returned them after they gave her 15 years of bad luck.

She wrote a confession letter detailing her theft and her subsequent misfortunes, including two cases of breast cancer and financial problems.

Nicole wrote: ‘Please take them back, they are bad luck.’

She said she brought the artifacts because she wanted to own a piece of history that no one else had, but that there was “so much negative energy in them… linked to that land of destruction.”

She said at the time: ‘I’m now 36 and have had breast cancer twice. The last time ended in a double mastectomy.

‘My family and I also had financial problems. We are good people and I don’t want to pass this curse on to my family or children.’

Her package also contained a confession letter written by a couple from Canada who stole from the site in 2005.

She said they took the artifacts without thinking of those who suffered there thousands of years ago.

The ancient city is one of the most visited attractions in Italy and has seen many tourists stealing from its ruins.

So many stolen relics have been returned to the site, along with letters expressing guilt, that officials in Pompeii set up a museum to display them.

Gabriel Zuchtriegel said they had received hundreds of apologetic letters from tourists who stole artifacts from the ancient site, many of whom called it a “curse.”

Speaking about the latest case of the young tourist who returned three pumice stones, he told RaiNews24: ‘We responded to the lady who wrote to us because her letter is very moving, but I remember: stealing goods from archaeological sites is a crime and we must report everything to the authorities.”

He added: ‘Many people write to us about the alleged curse and tell us about the misfortunes they suffered at work or during illness: these are moving and sad things. Many write that they are returning items stolen as children, these are thefts from decades ago.’

Zuchtriegel said “there is no point in taking these items,” before adding: “We are also monitoring the site with video surveillance, but the site is large and it could happen that something is stolen.”

Some thieves have even tried to sell parts of Pompeii online, with a stone from the ruins appearing on eBay in 2015.