Virginian squares off against Poland over rare rifle

To my mind, its not a matter of "should", its a matter of "What's the easiest way to get this thing back?"

Somehow, paying the guy seems easier (and more than likely ultimately cheaper) than dealing with a lawsuit.

It's not like it was stolen from an individual that can't afford to buy it back or even from Bill Gates. You're talking about an entire nation with an economy nearing $1,000,000,000,000 and I'm sure 10s or hundreds of BILLIONS in tax and other revenue.

It's been gone for decades, no one cared. It only makes sense to fork over 0.00008% of your national product (or the equivalent of 17 thousandth of one penny per person) to retrieve your "national treasure".
 
How Poland wants to handle their business is their business. They have multiple options to handle the process and they started with the one that resides with legal agreements between countries for antiquities. It is a normal way to handle such matters with such materials.

http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=354912&CategoryId=14095
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/26/us-stolenart-italy-idUSBRE83P1GY20120426
http://www.kpbs.org/news/2012/oct/26/us-returns-4000-stolen-antiquities-mexico/
 
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" But rather than steal it from its rightful owner, why can't Poland cough up the money to actually pay for it?"

Ah, but that is the question now, isn't it?

Exactly WHO is the truly rightful owner?

Is it, as Poland has said, them, because the rifle was stolen from them?

Or is it the guy in Virginia? Even though he may have bought it in good faith, he may very well be in possession of stolen property.

In that case, who has more rights under the law?

The original owner, from whom it was stolen?

Or the current owner/possessor who may have bought it in good faith, but who is still in possession of stolen property?

The same discussion takes place regularly regarding fine art that was looted by the Nazis.

Even decades later, people who own paintings, sculpture, etc., are going to court to defend their purchase and possession of items they bought in good faith against either governments or individuals (or families/descendants) from whom the item was stolen.

In many cases, the modern possessor loses the item and the purchase money because at the end of the day, even in good faith, they bought stolen property.

It's a lot easier to look at a situation like this and start railing against "BIG BAD GUBMINT STEALING POOR INNOCENT MAN'S PROPERTY!"

But that really just covers up the true issues of the case.
 
The three links provided say that those were stolen items. The rifle in question, would not have been stolen, if it left with US military permission, like every other spoils or captured weapon, which more than likely, it very well did. Of course, Poland will swear it was stolen, but any government would, if they thought it would be handed back for free.

Besides this, it worries me about how much Homeland Security has to do with this, and how much power has been granted to them. It seems more and more that they have become the US governments new gestapo. This action has nothing to do with US security, so why have they become involved, instead of the FBI or BATFE?
 
"It's been gone for decades, no one cared."

Actually, if you read up on the very little history of this rifle, the Poles have cared QUITE A bit.

There's apparently one in a private collection in Germany that they've been trying to get for years.


"It's not like it was stolen from an individual that can't afford to buy it back or even from Bill Gates."

Why should that matter in the very least?

You go to Paris, and on a whim, you pocket the Eiffel Tower, come back and set it up in your back yard.

You didn't steal it from an individual, but you did steal it, the French are righteously ****** about it, and want it back.

Obviously France can pay you to return it. But why should the people of French pay part of their tax money to have returned to them something that is part of their cultural birthright?

There's the rub... You tried to remove people from the equation, but you simply can't.

When you say "Let Poland pay for it!" you're really saying "Let every hardworking Pole who pays taxes pay for it!"
 
That is standard legal practice. It just seems like an unnecessary technicality under these circumstances. Government of all kinds and places burn money like they're using it for firewood. The idea that they can't just buy the thing from the guy seems silly to me.
You know, maybe only spend $15.235 million on studying the flatulence of the Polish Evergreen Beetle (fictional character for dramatic effect) instead of the planned $15.3 million. Know what I mean?
 
"The rifle in question, would not have been stolen, if it left with US military permission, like every other spoils or captured weapon, which more than likely, it very well did. Of course, Poland will swear it was stolen, but any government would, if they thought it would be handed back for free."

Did you read the Polish complaint, Dixie?

The Poles say that the rifle was illegally taken from their possession (stolen) by German soldiers who invaded in 1939.

At that point, the fact that the Americans recovered it from German possession is irrelevant. The Americans recovered stolen property.

Yes, they let it go, probably in good faith, but that doesn't invalidate the Polish claims of their property being stolen by the Germans.

Once again we go right back to the art analogy.

Once the Nazis overran a nation, they systematically looted its art treasures (both those held privately and those held in national collections) and either returned them to Germany as "property of the Reich" or sold them through neutral nations like Switzerland or Sweden.

After World War II some of those art treasures were even cleared to return to the United States with GIs because in a lot of cases neither the GIs nor the officers approving the transfer had a clue to the item's significance.

None of that changes the simple fact that the item in question was stolen property.
 
"Know what I mean?"

To be perfectly honest....

No. I don't.

I don't see why it should make a difference.

You could just as easily say "Let Brian Pfleuger spend a little less on Big Macs and Starbucks and pay Mike Irwin for the return of property that is rightfully Brian's but which was stolen from him a number of years ago."

I might be a lot less inclined to see Poland's point of view in this matter if their ONLY intention was to take possession of the rifle and then auction it off to the highest bidder.

But that's clearly not the case.
 
I guess we shall not agree.

Mike is in possession of property stolen from Brian's family 75 years ago. Mike has no idea it's stolen. Brian's family has two choices to get it back. Demand it and wait as long as it takes and pay whatever it costs to get through the legal challenges or each member of the family can pay 1 US cent and get the item back immediately.

Both choices are "within their rights", certainly.

As I said before, the cost of that rifle is 0.0016 US pennies per polish person.

Me? I'd pay it. You, you'd sue. It's all good. Neither of us has to understand the other.
 
Mike,

Even if the German's stole it, and it was recovered by someone in the US forces, our government gave written permission to that person to keep it, and formed a contract as good as a bill of sale, that made it legally theirs, and made it able to be owned or sold. It also put the liability on the US government. If so, and it has changed hands, legally, then someone owes the people who claim that right of ownership, that our own government gave them. Once money and possession changed hands, the first time, it kind of made things moot, as now there's money or value to be accounted for. To me, either our own government needs to pay for it, since they declared it legal, or the Poles, if they want it back so bad, or collect its worth from our government, or really, from Germany. Somebody owes the last owner, because of legal ownership, and they are owed its worth. If it had never been sold, then things would not have been so murky, but still there was the fact that the US government said it was legal to become someones property in the first place. The only way it could not, would be if it was stolen, and somebody slipped it here, without the US governments knowledge, thus it would truly be stolen property. Our government can't take something, that they declared legal, and not pay a fair value for it.

However, there is a light at the end of the tunnel, in that the US could look to see what of ours may still be in the Poles possession, and demand it back too. I'm sure they could find something of equal value.
 
I find myself wondering how many "Polish National Treasures" were removed to Stalin's Russia...and how many Russia of today will send back to Poland.
How far will this go...will Norway declare the Norwegian Colt 1911 my Dad brought home from the war a national treasure? After all...it is dated 1929, and no doubt was "stolen" by the krauts before my Dad recovered it. I suppose Dad should have notified the nearest Norwegian embassy he had their pistol.
I guess Poland is lucky this rifle seems to have been well cared for...it's owner could have been named Bubba, and he could have said to himself "this thing would be perfect if I can just Dremel it to fit my Tapco SKS folder"
 
Me? I'd pay it. You, you'd sue. It's all good. Neither of us has to understand the other.
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No, you have misunderstood completely. I have not represented what I would do in the least. I am simply explaining what Poland has done. I am not Poland and I am not Polish.

Requesting back antiquities items through diplomatic or treaty agreement does not really cost much in the way of money if the country where the item is located actually complies with the treaty. Poland isn't suing the collector. Poland isn't suing the US (not yet, anyway).

If anyone is suing, it will be the collector to try to get the gun back, but as noted in the article cited in the OP, the collector isn't likely to do that. Even if he does sue, he won't be suing Poland because Poland doesn't have the gun. The VA AG filed a complaint asking for the case to be removed, but this complaint isn't against Poland, but against the US government. So this notion that Poland is spending all this money on a lawsuit is a not issue. They have not filed a lawsuit thus far, but simply made a typical request for an antiquities item to be returned.
 
I find myself wondering how many "Polish National Treasures" were removed to Stalin's Russia...and how many Russia of today will send back to Poland.
How far will this go...will Norway declare the Norwegian Colt 1911 my Dad brought home from the war a national treasure? After all...it is dated 1929, and no doubt was "stolen" by the krauts before my Dad recovered it. I suppose Dad should have notified the nearest Norwegian embassy he had their pistol.
I guess Poland is lucky this rifle seems to have been well cared for...it's owner could have been named Bubba, and he could have said to himself "this thing would be perfect if I can just Dremel it to fit my Tapco SKS folder"
Click to expand...

That is exactly what I fear will happen, and Poland has just opened up a can of worms they may wish they didn't.

If it was truly stolen property, and not made legal by the US Government to be brought here, I would say, yes, send it back, and the poor bloke who last had it just learned a valuable lesson, and hopefully they receive no charges for receiving stolen property. However, this does not seem to be the case, and the US Government is liable for it, as they made the ruling that it was fair property, but then, to make it worse, money has been changed hands, and that money or value, somebody is going to have to pay for.

To me, to be fair about it, the US Government should pay the fair value, as they made the judgment, and collect theirs back from Germany, who Poland claims were the thieves to start with. However, if Poland wants to get snotty about it, where were they, actually, when WWII was going on, and Warsaw was made a large Jewish internment camp? They say that they fought beside us, but I can't place that much of it. They need to remember that they were invaded by Germany, their weapons seized, and lost quickly, and then were taken over by Russia, then stayed that way for a good long time. Things happen during war and things are lost, so they need to get over it.

This could also open up things about all of the legalized pirating the US did in the early years of our nation too. All it takes to get the ball rolling is a case similar to this. One would think that there would be an international statute of limitations in place in the treaties.
 
"Even if the German's stole it, and it was recovered by someone in the US forces, our government gave written permission to that person to keep it, and formed a contract as good as a bill of sale, that made it legally theirs, and made it able to be owned or sold."

That's NOT the way it works, even under US law. Stolen property is recoverable at ANY point in the chain of possession, even if the current possessor bought it in good faith.

There is NO legal precedent for "Finders Keepers, Losers Weepers," not even if you thrown in a "Neener Neener Pork and Beaner" exigent circumstance.

In other words, the old school ground rights of possession don't apply.
 
"I find myself wondering how many "Polish National Treasures" were removed to Stalin's Russia...and how many Russia of today will send back to Poland."

As far as I know, Russia is not a signatory to the treaty that is being invoked.

Russia HAS repatriated a few items, but very likely only a miniscule amount of what they actually overran.

"will Norway declare the Norwegian Colt 1911 my Dad brought home from the war a national treasure? After all...it is dated 1929, and no doubt was "stolen" by the krauts before my Dad recovered it. I suppose Dad should have notified the nearest Norwegian embassy he had their pistol."

Or my Polish Radom?

In both cases, the answer is likely no.

In the case of your Colt, it's not a Norwegian national treasure. It wasn't designed by a Norwegian, it's not particularly rare or valuable, and after WW II the Norwegians released thousands into the surplus market.

Same with my Radom, even though it was designed by two Poles. Thousands were manufactured, to the point where the Poles eventually released them into the surplus market.

That's not the case with this rifle. It's incredibly rare.



Don't get me wrong. I really do feel for this guy in Virginia.

But, after having studied art for years, and having more than a passing familiarity with how World Wars I and II (especially WW II) resulted in nations being looted wholesale, I also understand where the Polish government is falling on this.
 
"This could also open up things about all of the legalized pirating the US did in the early years of our nation too. All it takes to get the ball rolling is a case similar to this. One would think that there would be an international statute of limitations in place in the treaties."

You really don't have any clue about how frequently these treaties are invoked, do you?

Not long ago the United States invoked the treaty to recover numerous Indian artifacts that had been removed from tribal lands and made their way to the European markets.
 
Mike, treaty or not, we'll just have to agree to disagree. Spoils of war are thousands of years old, and what Poland may say is stolen, Germany will say it wasn't. Germany has that right, as they ran the country after the invasion, and this was a weapon that was seized. It would be the same as anything the US took, while in the countries it has invaded, and that has been a few of them. Any country will say it was legally seized instead of stolen when it's them. Seized meaning they made it their property. The same thing goes with anything the US seized from Germany too.

The legal pirating, I mentioned, has nothing to do with native Americans, as it has to do with pirating on the high seas, that our own government allowed certain shipping companies to do from the east coast harbors. They would board ships from Britain and France, take the loot, and sell it at auction once back at the harbor in places like Baltimore, etc. The US government issued a legal license for them to do it. Now, if those countries want it back, who will they take it from, the ones who legally purchased it at the port, and then on down the line until today, or the US government?

The same goes with the travesty of the folks that found treasure down in the keys, and was forced to give back to governments who hadn't even tried to look for it beforehand, and considered it lost, plus was paid back for it already, years ago, by the insurance consortium's like Lloyd's of London.

Last, why doesn't Poland want any other weapons back, that were seized by the Germans, or Russia for that matter? It's not so much historic, truly, it's because of the worth of it, and they want it. If it has worth to them, then it has worth to the guy who legally had it, too. If it had been legally stolen, I would say send it back, but it wasn't.
 
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