Alva has worked for years at the Bruning Archeological Museum in Lambayeque, Peru.

The robbers had discovered a crypt of a lord, filled with jewels and gold, and Alva knew it was significant.

[3] The findings were later described by the National Geographic Society as the richest intact pre-Columbian tomb in the Western Hemisphere.

[4] During many of these years, Alva was the director of the Bruning Archaeological Museum in Lambayeque, Peru.

[6] As a result, Alva was able to show that the civilization was able to spread farther than originally thought.