Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Decision in the Spielberg Stolen Rockwell Case

In a 2008 post on the the battle over a stolen Rockwell painting that got a lot of press because it had ended up in Steven Spielberg's collection, I said I thought "the issue ... is going to be whether Solomon, the theft victim, reasonably should have discovered that the painting had been found back in 1989 (in which case he would lose on statute of limitations grounds)." Well, there was a trial in the case last month, and Solomon did lose, because not only did the evidence show he should have known the painting was being sold at auction in 1989, it was clear that he actually did know about it: in fact, he had entered into an agreement to share in the sales proceeds!

More here, including a copy of the court's decision, from the Riverfront Times.