## Facts

- Dr. Max Stern, a Jewish art dealer in Düsseldorf, was compelled by Nazi authorities to liquidate his gallery inventory through a government-approved auction house.
- In 1937, Stern consigned works, including a Winterhalter painting, to the Lempertz Auction House, where they were sold at depressed prices under coercive conditions.
- Stern fled Germany and was blocked from retrieving proceeds; wartime destruction of records impeded later provenance tracking.
- After World War II, Stern pursued recovery through military and administrative channels and attempted to locate missing works through public advertisements.
- Decades later, the Winterhalter painting resurfaced in the United States in the possession of Maria-Louise Bissonnette, who acquired it through her family.
- In 2005, a state claims office expert identified the painting as part of Stern’s forced-sale inventory and informed Bissonnette; Stern’s successors demanded return, which she refused.
- Stern’s foundation trustees filed a diversity action in federal court seeking replevin and related relief; after discovery closed, Bissonnette changed counsel and sought to reopen discovery.

## Issues

1. Whether the district court abused its discretion by denying the defendant’s motion to reopen discovery after substitution of counsel.
2. Whether laches barred the plaintiffs’ replevin claim given the long passage of time since the 1937 forced sale.

## Decision

- The First Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the plaintiffs.
- The district court acted within its discretion in denying the request to reopen discovery; a change in counsel alone did not justify reopening, and the defendant did not show concrete, non-cumulative discovery needs or resulting unfairness.
- The laches defense failed as a matter of law because the record did not support both unreasonable delay and prejudice attributable to the plaintiffs’ delay.
- The plaintiffs were entitled to possession of the painting on their replevin claim.

## Legal Principles

- Denial of a post-deadline motion to reopen discovery is reviewed for abuse of discretion; substitution of counsel does not, by itself, entitle a party to additional discovery.
- Laches requires proof of (1) unreasonable delay by the claimant and (2) prejudice to the opposing party caused by that delay.
- In evaluating delay for laches, courts consider the claimant’s diligence in light of circumstances that impair identification and location of property, including loss of records and obstacles tied to wrongful dispossession.
- Prejudice for laches must be concrete and causally linked to the claimant’s delay, not merely to historical events or general evidentiary difficulties inherent in old transactions.
- Equitable defenses are disfavored where they would perpetuate the effects of a coerced transfer and where the possessor’s equities are no stronger than those of prior holders in a chain stemming from a forced sale.

## Conclusion

The First Circuit upheld return of a painting traced to a Nazi-coerced liquidation, holding that the defendant’s request to reopen discovery was properly denied and that laches could not defeat replevin absent proof of unreasonable delay and plaintiff-caused prejudice once the artwork was identified.


Vineberg v. Bissonnette, 548 F.3d 50 (1st Cir. 2008)