SAN FRANCISCO – A California production company obtained a partial summary judgment in a case involving the ownership of a famous French painting titled Wine of Babylon.
U.S. Circuit Judge Margaret McKeown, in the bench of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, issued a 31-page ruling on Aug. 29, affirming and vacating in part the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, in the lawsuit filed by G&G Productions LLC against Rita Rusic.
G&G sued Rusic in regards to the ownership of Wine of Babylon, an oil painting by the French artist Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Judge M Margaret McKeown
As mentioned in the ruling, G&G "alleged that Rusic stole the painting from her former husband and G&G’s predecessor-in-interest, Vittorio Cecchi Gori, an Academy Award-winning Italian film producer."
The same document stated that "the panel applied the substantive law of California, which involved determining the accrual dates of G&G’s various claims and assessing their timeliness under California’s borrowing statute," and that "there was no dispute that all of G&G’s causes of action arose in Italy."
Just like in a movie critique, Judge McKeown starts her opinion in the ruling with a passionate description of the case.
"What happens when you cross an Academy Award-winning Italian film producer, a Croatian actress-turned-producer, a bitter divorce, an oil painting worth millions of dollars, and dozens of pages of untranslated Italian law in the court of appeals? The answer, we conclude, is a procedural morass and a remand to the district court," McKeown said.
As stated in the ruling, Vittorio Gori, the owner of the company, "is a well-known film producer and former Italian politician," who, in 1983, "married Rita Rusic, a Croatian-born actress, singer, and film producer who is now a citizen of Italy," agreeing to "keep their assets separate under Italian law."
In 1998, per the ruling, "Gori purchased a large oil painting entitled Wine of Babylon (1984) by the late American artist Jean Michel Basquiat from the Tony Shafrazi Gallery in New York for $330,000."
The painting was shipped to Rome in early 1999.
The couple's marriage started to fall apart, and Rusic, as of the ruling, "filed for divorce from Gori in May 1999, accusing Gori of physical abuse and infidelity." During that time, the painting disappeared from the couple's home.
Gori claimed in the ruling that "Rusic smuggled the painting out of the residence and stashed it elsewhere," while Rusic said that "she did not take—and, because of a head injury allegedly caused by Gori, could not have taken—the painting, which actually disappeared when Mr. Gori caused movers working for him to remove numerous items of personal property from [the residence] in 1999 or possibly 2000.'”
After several letters exchanged, in attempts to return the painting, Gori, as of the decision, "filed a criminal complaint against Rusic in Italian court on March 22, 2010," with Rusic acquitted of the charges.
The ruling also stated that, "on February 22, 2010—one month before Gori filed his criminal complaint in Italy—Gori assigned any rights that he held in Wine of Babylon to his long-standing Italian attorney, Giovanni Nappi, to settle a €2M debt for unpaid legal fees. Nappi then assigned his rights to the painting to G&G, in exchange for a 50% ownership interest in the newly formed limited-liability company."
In 2015, per the document, "filed suit against Rusic in the United States District Court for the Central District of California, asserting state-law tort claims of conversion, replevin, unjust enrichment, and declaratory relief."
The district court decided on Rusic's favor, with summary judgment granted.
In the issue of declaratory relief, McKeown vacated the summary judgment, stating that Canio Mazzaro, a former boyfriend of Rusic's who supposedly saw the painting at a party in 2011, "has never had possession of the painting, and has never claimed that he obtained the painting from Rusic or any other party."
District Judge James Donato concurred.
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit Case number 16-56107