Park West Art Auction
Practice:
Consumer Protection
Phase:
Current Chimicles & Tikellis LLP, along with its co-counsel, has filed four class action complaints in the District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan on behalf of a class of individuals who purchased artwork from on-board cruise ship art auctions held by Park West Gallery, Inc., PWG Florida, Inc., Vista Fine Art, LLC d/b/a/ Park West at Sea, and/or Albert Scaglione (collectively, “Park West”).
Park West styles itself as one of the largest art dealers in the world, and generates half of its revenue from shipboard art auctions that are conducted on cruise ship lines such as Regent Seven Seas, Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Carnival, Norwegian, Oceania, Disney and Holland America. Park West, with these Cruise Lines, operated a fraudulent and deceptive scheme to target and defraud the naïve art purchaser by touting that the artwork sold on these cruise ships were “good investments” and that they would appraise for many more times the purchase price when, in fact, the artwork plaintiffs received was either of low value, worthless or fake.
Park West also sold phony appraisals to art purchasers. The appraisal value was always well above the purchase price paid for the art. Park West only conducted its on-board art auctions while cruise ships were traveling in international waters in an effort to avoid the application of state consumer protection laws to its illegal activities.
The Complaints allege that Park West conspired with Royal Caribbean, Carnival, Celebrity, and Holland America Cruise Lines to engage in illegal schemes violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act (“RICO”) and state consumer protection and contract laws.
Individuals who purchased artwork and/or appraisals from Park West while from a shipboard cruise line auction may be part of the class that this lawsuit seeks to represent. The class action complaints are attached below.
| Attachment | Size |
|---|---|
| Bohm amended complaint filed 72409.pdf | 2.13 MB |
| Alleman Complaint Filed 72209.pdf | 785.75 KB |
| Mullen Complaint filed 72409.pdf | 1.35 MB |
| Hatter Complaint Filed 72909.pdf | 1.75 MB |
Attorneys to Contact:
Denise Davis Schwartzman (DeniseSchwartzman@chimicles.com)
Kimberly A. Evans (KimberlyEvans@chimicles.com)
361 West Lancaster Avenue, Haverford, PA 19041 Phone: 610-642-8500