Mark Hofmann

The document seemed to be the transcript that Smith's Scribe Martin Harris had presented to Charles Anthon, a Columbia classics professor, in 1828.

According to the Mormon scripture Joseph Smith–History, the transcript and its unusual reformed Egyptian characters were copied by Smith from the golden plates from which he translated the Book of Mormon.

Hofmann constructed his version to fit Anthon's description of the document, and its discovery made Hofmann's reputation.

Dean Jessee, an of Smith's papers and the best-known expert on handwriting and old documents in the Historical Department of the LDS Church, concluded that the document was a Smith holograph.

The LDS Church announced the discovery of the Anthon Transcript in April and purchased it from Hofmann for more than US$20,000.

Appraised by the LDS Church for US$25,000, it was purchased on October 13 in exchange for several artifacts the church owned in duplicate, including a $5 gold Mormon coin, Deseret banknotes, and a first edition of the Book of Mormon.

Assuming the document to be genuine, prominent Mormon academic Hugh Nibley predicted that the discovery promised "as good a test as we'll ever get of the authenticity of the Book of Mormon" because he thought the paper might be translated.

Zoology professor Barry Fell soon after claimed to have decoded the text.

Hofmann promptly dropped out of school and went into business as a dealer in rare books.

He soon fabricated other historically significant documents and became noted among LDS Church history buffs for his "discoveries" of previously unknown materials pertaining to the Latter Day Saint movement.

These deceived not only members of the First Presidency – notably Gordon B. Hinckley, then the de facto president of the church due to the poor health of more senior leaders – but also document experts and distinguished historians.

According to Richard and Joan Ostling, Hofmann was by this time a "closet apostate" motivated not only by greed but also by "the desire to embarrass the church by undermining church history".

In a forged cover letter, purportedly written by Thomas Bullock and dated January 27, 1865, Bullock chastises Young for having all copies of the blessing destroyed.

Bullock writes that although he believes Young to be the legitimate leader of the LDS Church, he would keep his copy of the blessing.

He had learned that his maternal grandparents had continued to secretly practice polygamy for more than a decade after the church publicly ended the practice (it was not fully renounced until 1904).

A former girlfriend believed Hofmann performed his mission only because of social pressure and the desire not to disappoint his parents.

After Hofmann returned from his mission, he enrolled as a pre-med major at Utah State University.

Mark William Hofmann (born December 7, 1954) is an American counterfeiter, forger, and convicted murderer.

Widely regarded as one of the most accomplished forgers in history, Hofmann is especially noted for his creation of fake documents related to the history of the Latter Day Saint movement.

When his schemes began to unravel, he constructed bombs to murder three people in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Mark Hofmann was born in 1954 in Salt Lake City, Utah, to Lucille (née Sears) and William Hofmann (1928–1993).

He was raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church).

He was a below-average high school student, but had many hobbies including stage magic, electronics, chemistry, and stamp and coin collecting.

Hofmann and his friends were said to have made bombs for fun on the outskirts of Murray, Utah.

Hofmann graduated 573 in a class of 700.

According to Hofmann, while still a teenage coin collector, he forged a rare mint mark on a dime and was told by an organization of coin collectors that it was genuine.

Like many young men in the LDS Church, Hofmann volunteered to spend two years as an LDS missionary, and in 1973 the church sent him to its mission in Bristol, England.

Hofmann told his parents that he had baptized several converts; he did not tell them that he had also perused Fawn M. Brodie's biography of Joseph Smith, No Man Knows My History.

While in England, Hofmann enjoyed investigating bookshops and buying early Mormon material, as well as books critiquing Mormonism.

He later told prosecutors that he had lost his faith in the LDS Church and become an atheist around age 14.

In 1979, he married Doralee "Dorie" Olds, and the couple eventually had four children.

In 1980, Hofmann claimed that he had found a 17th-century King James Bible with a folded paper gummed inside.

During the early 1980s, a significant number of new Mormon documents came into the marketplace.

Sometimes the church received these as donations, and others it purchased.

According to the Ostlings, "The church publicized some of the acquisitions; it orchestrated public relations for some that were known to be sensitive; others it acquired secretly and suppressed."

In 1981, Hofmann presented the LDS Church with a document which supposedly provided evidence that Smith had designated his son Joseph Smith III, rather than Brigham Young, as his successor.

The first two bombs killed two people on October 15, 1985.

On the following day, a third bomb exploded in Hofmann's car.

He was arrested for the bombings three months later, and in 1987 pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder, one count of theft by deception and one count of fraud.

Dorie Olds Hofmann filed for divorce in 1987, two years after Hofmann's crimes came to light, and became co-founder of a holistic medicine company.