An order issued by the Michigan Court of Appeals on 11 December 2009, effectively brought Royal Caribbean Cruises, Ltd. as co-defendants with Park West Gallery, back into a court case from which they had been dismissed. The complaint against Royal Caribbean, Park West Gallery, its CEO Albert Scaglione, and gallery director Morris Shapiro, was filed in December 2008 by dissatisfied customers of Park West Gallery and Royal Caribbean cruises through the plaintiffs' Michigan attorneys, Kaufman, Payton and Chapa. It alleged violation of Michigan's warranty in fine arts statute, fraud, breach of contract, violation of the Michigan consumer protection act, violation of the Michigan art multiples sales act, negligent misrepresentation, conspiracy and unjust enrichment.
On November 30th, 2009, Hon. Nanci J. Grant, Circuit Judge of Oakland, State of Michigan, ordered the dismissal with prejudice of Park West Gallery's Counter-Complaint against Counter-Defendants Julian Howard and Sharon Day after Park West Gallery attorneys approached counsel for Day and Howard, to announce the gallery's voluntary dismissal of the case (Case No. 08-096952-CZ).
On 16 November 2009, WBALTV Baltimore aired an investigation into the purchase of a Salvador Dali print for $12,000 by Fine Art Registry member Richard English aboard the Carnival Miracle in July 2006.
A Third Party Complaint was filed on 26 August 2009 against Bernard Ewell, of Santa Fe, New Mexico, an appraiser and self-styled expert in the works of Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dali, who has for years been paid by Park West Gallery, a Michigan based gallery which sells art mainly through cruise ship based art auctions, to state that the large number of Salvador Dali prints the gallery sells are genuine and that the alleged Dali signatures many of them bear are legitimate.
Mark Jacobs, 41, U.S. citizen and resident of Garrison returns to New York after Royal Caribbean forcibly removed him from its Jewel of the Seas cruise ship. Jacobs was left at the Oslo, Norway port on July 26, forcing him to find his way to England...On this particular 12-day cruise, Park West is running three art auctions on days when the ship is at sea in international waters. Jacobs attended the first auction on July 18, and became concerned that the claims of the auctioneer might not be wholly accurate. Using on-line searching, he found that there were lawsuits and class action suits in addition to many individual stories regarding people being duped by Park West. Jacobs says, "Even though I have never bid at a Park West auction, I became concerned for my fellow vacationers. When I heard there would be two more auctions, I felt I had to let people know about Park West's track record."
Press Release - Park West Gallery Secretly Owned Eight of Rembrandt's Copper Etching Plates Since August 2003, Four New Articles From Fine Art Registry® Reveal.
According to several reports received from Park West Gallery auctioneers aboard cruise ships and from other sources, at the end of January 2009 Park West Gallery ordered ship auctioneers to stop selling the company’s large stock of Salvador Dali prints and return all unsold inventory to headquarters in Southfield, Michigan.
Park West's defamation case against Fine Art Registry was dismissed by US District Judge Ursula Ungaro on 10 February 2009, "for failure to prosecute in the name of the real party in interest," thus ending Park West Gallery's boasts of a "multi-state legal suit against Fine Art Registry" so frequently repeated in its press releases, paid internet ads, and to dissatisfied customers calling in to request refunds for artwork purchased.
A Complaint and Demand for Jury Trial was filed on 23 December 2008 against Park West Galleries, Inc., Albert Scaglione and Morris Shapiro (owner and gallery director, respectively) and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., by the Farmington Hills, MI, attorneys, Kaufman, Payton and Chapa, for Plaintiffs Albert and Vivian Best, Sharon Day, Julian Howard, Deborah Austin, Cheryl Crist, Heidi Rice, Michael and Maria Vallillo and Martha Szostak, all customers of Park West Galleries and all, except for Albert and Vivian Best, Fine Art Registry members.
On December 18th, 2008, the Honorable Lawrence P. Zatkoff of the Southern Division of the Eastern Michigan District Court, set aside a Default judgment against Fine Art Registry in the case filed by Park West Galleries Inc, claiming defamation in articles published on the FineArtRegistry.com website.
Global Fine Art Registry, LLC, has produced and released a documentary video in which internationally renowned experts on Salvador Dali and a research scientist examine a set of Dali Divine Comedy prints sold by Park West Gallery for close to half a million dollars, and state their unanimous opinions that the prints bear forged Dali signatures, in addition to a number of other anomalies in the set of boxed prints.
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