Picasso Exporter Looses Appeal

March 3 2021

Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:

The ex-banker Jamie Botin, who attempted to illegally export a Picasso from Spain in 2012-3, has had his second appeal rejected by the Spanish courts.

Botin acquired Head of a Young Woman (1906) in 1977. Subsequently, the Spanish State decided to declare the work a national treasure when he tried to sell the painting through Christie's in 2012. The work was eventually confiscated from his yacht by the Spanish authorities in Corsica in 2015, who had stipulated that the painting may not leave the country.

Due to this latest ruling the former vice president of Santander will now have to serve 18 months in prison and pay a €91.7m fine. Ouch.

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