The Nahmad Counter Attack Heats Up

The Nahmad family has been slow to respond to the publicity onslaught from Mondex Corporation, the entity driving the case surrounding the Modigliani the Nahmads have held in their art entity for some time. Mondex insists the work is subject to a restitution claim but has yet to prevail in court.

Now, the Nahmads and their lawyer, Richard Golub, have cooperated with the NY Post to get this story on Mondex’s James Palmer:

Michel Strauss, [t]he former head of the impressionist modernist department at Sotheby’s in London, Strauss was contacted by Palmer around 2014.

“He sent a letter saying that a Degas, which once belonged to my grandfather, may have been stolen [by Nazis]. He told me that they could research it and get me restitution,” Strauss tells The Post.

But Strauss did his own research and “proved to my satisfaction that the painting had been sold at my grandfather’s auction to a French singer, Simone Berriau, in 1932.”

Palmer’s reaction to the news?

“He was a bit pissed off at me,” says Strauss. “He tried to insist and insist” that the painting had been stolen from Strauss’ grandfather. […]

”Where the Nahmads are concerned, Strauss believes that Palmer has his work cut out for him.

“[Palmer is] not going to get a penny out of the Nahmads,” Strauss says. “They are professionals, they know the history of their pictures and they will not pay out anything to get rid of somebody.”

This ‘Holocaust hustler’ makes a living off of Nazi-stolen art  (New York Post)