Art buyer will pay $10M to settle Marcos lawsuit

A foreign art collector who purchased a masterpiece by impressionist painter Claude Monet that had disappeared from Imelda Marcos’ Manhattan townhouse in 1986 has agreed to pay $10 million to the more than 9,000 Filipinos who successfully sued the estate of Imelda’s husband, Ferdinand Marcos, for the human rights abuses they suffered under Marcos’ rule as president of the Philippines, according to the lawyers for the abuse victims and their heirs.

The lawyers for the class-action plaintiffs, to whom a federal judge here awarded a nearly $2 billion judgment in 1995 against Marcos’ estate, filed the $10 million settlement with the buyer of the painting in U.S. District Court in Hono­lulu last week under seal. They are hoping the court will grant them final approval of the settlement in September.

By filing the settlement under seal, the lawyers have kept confidential the names of the buyer and the art gallery that sold the painting, the purchase price and other details. However, in other documents they filed last week, the lawyers said in exchange for the $10 million, the class-action plaintiffs agree to relinquish all claims to the painting and promise not to sue the gallery.

The painting, "Le Bassin aux Nympheas" (1899), another one by Monet and two more valuable paintings by other artists disappeared from the townhouse during the chaos of Marcos’ final days in power. Their whereabouts remained unknown for more than two decades.

Then last November, a state court in New York unsealed an indictment against Vilma Bau­tista, Imelda’s former personal secretary, and two of Bau­tista’s nephews for conspiracy and other charges in connection with the theft of the four paintings from the townhouse and sale of the Monet.

According to the indictment, Bau­tista sold the Monet to a London art gallery in September 2010 for $32 million without Imelda Marcos’ knowledge or consent. The art gallery in turn sold the painting to a buyer for an undisclosed amount.

Of the $32 million, Bau­tista pocketed $28 million. The rest went to two unnamed real estate brokers as their commission for brokering the sale, the indictment says. Bau­tista then distributed nearly $10 million to her nephews and two unnamed co-conspirators and spent nearly $3 million on debts and other expenses.

The plaintiff lawyers say the New York District Attorney seized the remaining $15 million that went to Bau­tista and the other paintings. They are suing Bau­tista and the district attorney for the proceeds of the sale of the Monet and the other artwork.

If the court here approves the $10 million settlement over the Monet and distribution of the settlement money, it will be just the second payment the victims of torture, summary execution, disappearance and their heirs will have received since winning their landmark human rights abuse case in 1995. In 2011, U.S. District Judge Manuel Real approved distribution of $10 million to the plaintiffs after three corporations created by Marcos cronies agreed that their 4,500 acres of land in Texas and Colo­rado were purchased and owned by the Marcos estate.