Opinion ID: 2470159
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Value of Le Marché

Text: Davis submits that, even if NSPA violations satisfy the contrary to law requirement of Section 1595a, the district court improperly granted summary judgment for the government on whether Le Marché's value at the time it entered the United States met the $5,000 threshold necessary for an NSPA violation. We review de novo the district court's grant of summary judgment, applying the same standard as the district court to determine whether a genuine issue of a material fact exists that would preclude judgment as a matter of law. Gallo v. Prudential Residential Servs., Ltd., 22 F.3d 1219, 1224 (2d Cir.1994). Here, Davis's evidence failed to raise a material issue of fact regarding Le Marché's value, and so the district court properly granted summary judgment to the government. At summary judgment, the undisputed evidence before the district court indicated that Le Marché was stolen on November 16, 1981, and that Adelman sold it to the Sharan Corporation for $8,500 on May 1, 1985. That soon after its importation Le Marché sold for a price seventy percent above the statutory minimum is strong evidence that it was valued at or above $5,000 at the time Guelton brought it into the United States. Therefore, in order to avoid summary judgment on this issue, Davis needed to come forward with some evidence tending to show that Le Marché was worth less than $5,000 at the time of importation. See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 250, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986) (genuine issues of material fact exist if a reasonable [factfinder] could return a verdict for the nonmoving party). This she failed to do. Davis's Local Rule 56.1 statement cites five pieces of evidence that she argues raise a genuine issue of material fact regarding Le Marché's value. The first is a declaration by expert appraiser Alex Rosenbergevidently directed to whether Davis is an innocent ownerstating that $8,500 was not an unreasonably low price for the Monotype, and that a sale price within that range should not trigger a suspicion that the work of art was stolen. This statement is hardly evidence that Le Marché was worth less than $8,500; the only reasonable inference that can be drawn from it is that the price Sharan Corporation paid for the monotype in 1985 approximated its fair market value, or, if anything, was too low (albeit not unreasonably low). The second is a declaration from art expert Gilbert Edelson explaining that several hundreds of thousands of prints are sold annually in the [United] States. Although a very small number of important, well-known rarer prints by artists such as Rembrandt will sell for substantial prices, the overwhelming number of prints sell for less than $5,000. However, Edelson's declaration is wholly silent on the value of Le Marché, and does not indicate whether or not it falls into the category of well-known rarer prints that command a premium price. It therefore does nothing to undermine the government's evidence that Le Marché was worth more than $5,000 during the relevant period. Similarly, not one of the depositions that Davis citesfrom the curator of the Musée Faure, from a federal agent who investigated this case, and from Adelmansheds any light on Le Marché's value. A jury presented with both the uncontradicted evidence that Le Marché was worth $8,500 in 1985 and the equivocal and irrelevant statements cited by Davis could not reasonably conclude that the monotype was worth less than $5,000 when it entered the United States. We therefore affirm the district court's finding that the government was entitled to summary judgment on that element of its forfeiture claim.