Partner Steven Lieberman is quoted in a Jewish Telegraphic Agency article titled "In trying to seize Russian assets, the US is taking a page from Chabad," on May 16, 2022.
The U.S. government recently announced it would seek to seize the assets of Russia's main development bank, VEB, in an effort to sanction Russia for invading Ukraine. "The federal government determined that VEB is a piggy bank for the Kremlin, it’s essentially a tool of the Russian state,” Steven told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The announcement thrilled Steven, who has been representing Chabad, a religious origination founded in 1775 in the Russian town of Lubavitch, pro bono in a lawsuit to recover from the Russian Federation the holy books and other materials that were stolen by the Soviet Union and the Nazis. A 2020 District Court ruling allows Chabad to identify and seize financial assets of the Russian government held in the U.S. in order to pay the sanctions - $50,000 per day - for refusing to return the books. Now that the U.S. has identified VEB and established a connection between it and the Russian government, Steven hopes "that if we can seize those assets, it will put enough pressure on Putin and his minions that they will finally decide to return to this library of holy books, which means so much to Jews throughout the world, but which means nothing to the Russian government.”
To read the article in its entirety, click here.
The Rothwell Figg team representing Chabad pro bono includes Steven, Robert Parker, Jennifer Nock, Richard Waterman, and Anjali Jenna (AJ) Teigen.
