Reflections on litigating holocaust stolen art cases.

AuthorBurris, Donald S.

TABLE OF CONTENTS I. GENERAL HISTORICAL OVERVIEW II. ANALYSIS OF RECENT AND CURRENT LITIGATION MATTERS A. The Altmann Case B. The Bennigson Case C. Other Holocaust Stolen Art Matters III. CONCLUSION I. GENERAL HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

In this Article we have attempted to provide an overview of the Nazi-looted art cases in their historical context. We have based the discussion on our knowledge and experience in litigating art law cases, particularly cases involving Nazi art looting, post-war restitution, and recent developments in art law.

Any discussion of the legal implications of crimes committed by Nazi authorities during the Holocaust must begin with an obvious disclaimer. While bringing cases to recover artwork stolen by Nazi authorities is self-evidently a worthy pursuit, and while our firm is very proud to be intensively involved in this effort, we cannot even imagine the extent of the atrocities suffered by our clients' ancestors (and our own) as a result of the high crimes committed against them. It is nonetheless humbly gratifying to work in this area of the law and to think that, in some small way, we are bringing comfort to the victims and their families. In the case of Mrs. Altmann, a vibrant and fascinating 89-year-old woman who vividly recalls the specific location in her uncle and aunt's residence of each Klimt masterpiece she is seeking to recover, this sense of personal gratification is particularly high.

As will be obvious to even a casual reader, these cases often involve complicated legal scenarios, particularly in the well-publicized Altmann proceeding and the Bennigson v. Alsdorf "Picasso case" both of which this Article discusses at length. (1) Accordingly, the case filings are substantial; readers who wish to further investigate these materials are invited to contact the Authors. In the Bennigson case, for example, our firm filed three separate complaints and one cross-complaint; these filings required not only multiple appearances in the California courts, but also an out-of-state appearance in Illinois, the current situs of the painting, and a coordination of efforts with the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California, which filed one of the complaints in the form of a seizure action. (2)

Mrs. Altmann's landmark case was appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court on the issue of sovereign immunity before the district court could even consider the substantive merits of the case. Our firm's opposition in presenting the case in the Supreme Court was not only private counsel representing the Austrian authorities but also a representative of the Solicitor General's Office. In an effort to obtain expeditious justice, as described below, Mrs. Altmann, per our suggestion, ultimately agreed to yet another forum--a mandatory arbitration proceeding in Austria. In some of the more recently filed cases, we anticipate that such procedural battles have only just begun, and may prove to be equally challenging. Nonetheless, in the face of the incredibly difficult and often time-consuming processes involved in undertaking art theft cases, we remains cautiously optimistic about the potential to obtain some significant redress and a modicum of justice for the victims' families.

The pervasiveness of Nazi art looting has been well documented and includes the theft, storage, and cataloging of thousands of paintings, some of which ended up in the private collections of Adolf Hitler, Hermann Goering, and other lesser-known Nazi functionaries. (3) The post-war governmental authorities in Germany, Austria, and, to a lesser extent, the formerly occupied European countries, developed post-war restitution programs that were implemented sporadically. In Mrs. Altmann's case, the Austrian authorities attempted to force the family representatives to waive claims to other potentially more valuable paintings to obtain the release of other paintings or properties. (4) While these and other restitution programs were discussed at the Vanderbilt Symposium, this Article focuses on the litigation arena.

We and the small group of colleagues who have been litigating such art theft cases (5) have based our civil actions on the following legal premise: under U.S. law, a thief cannot convey good title to a bona fide purchaser--good faith purchasers are required to return stolen property to their prior owners. This is obviously not a new rule. (6) A second basic premise, expressed in numerous cases and statutes, is that the U.S. governmental institutions, state and federal, have a strong public policy interest in seeking the return of Nazi-looted art.

  1. ANALYSIS OF RECENT AND CURRENT LITIGATION MATTERS

    In this Section we analyze the background and procedural and substantive contexts of several of the major cases our firm has been handling on a worldwide basis for Holocaust stolen art claimants.

    1. The Altmann Case

    The Altmann case, because it reached the Supreme Court and has a particularly interesting factual and procedural history, is the most well-known and well-published of our cases. The poignant facts were extensively summarized in the Complaint filed in the U.S. district court, and are excerpted below:

    1. MARIA ALTMANN was born into the affluent Jewish Bloch-Bauer family in Vienna, Austria in 1916. Every Sunday she and her four older siblings would...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT