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A judge ruled that 10
rare gold coins worth $80 million belonged to the U.S. government, not a family that
had sued the U.S. Treasury, saying it had illegally seized them.
The 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagle coin was originally
valued at $20, but sold for as much as $7.5 million at a Sotheby's auction in
2002, according to Courthouse News.
After President Theodore Roosevelt had the U.S.
abandon the gold standard, most of the 445,500 double eagles that the Philadelphia
Mint had struck were melted into gold bars.
However, a Philadelphia Mint cashier had managed
to give or sell some of them to a local coin dealer,Israel Switt.
In 2003, Switt's family, Joan Langbord, and her two
grandsons, drilled opened a safety deposit box that had belonged to him and
found the 10 coins.
When the Langbords gave the coins to the Philadelphia Mint
for authentification, the government seized them without compensating the
family.
The Langbords sued, saying the coins belonged to them.
In 2011, a jury decided that the coins belonged to the
government, but the family appealed.
Last week, Judge Legrome Davis of the Eastern District Court
of Pennsylvania, affirmed that decision, saying "the coins in question
were not lawfully removed from the United States Mint."
Barry Berke, an attorney for the Langbords, told
ABCNews.com, "This is a case that raises many novel legal questions,
including the limits on the government's power to confiscate property. The
Langbord family will be filing an appeal and looks forward to addressing these
important issues before the 3rd Circuit."
The family said in its suit that in another seizure of the
1933 double eagle, the government split the proceeds with the owner after
the coin sold for $7.59 million in 2002, according to Coinbooks.or
This World Hot Topics Blog is Originally from here :
Judge Says 10 Rare Gold Coins Worth $80 Million
Judge Says 10 Rare Gold Coins Worth $80 Million
