Q 37.1) Gift?Victor Gruen was a successful architect. Victor purchased a painting titled Schloss Kammer am Attersee II by a noted Austrian modernist, Gustav Klimt, and paid $8,000 for the painting. Four years after acquiring the painting, Victor wrote a letter to his son Michael, then an undergraduate student at Harvard University, giving the painting to Michael but reserving a life estate in the painting. The letter stated: Dear Michael: The 21st birthday, being an important event in life, should be celebrated accordingly. I therefore wish to give you as a present the oil painting by Gustav Klimt of Schloss Kammer which now hangs in the New York living room. Happy birthday again. Love, [Signed] Victor Because Victor retained a life interest in the painting, Michael never took possession of the painting. Victor died 17 years later. The painting was appraised at $2.5 million. When Michael requested the painting from his stepmother, Kemija Gruen, she refused to turn it over to him. Michael sued to recover the painting. The trial court held in favor of the stepmother. The appellate division reversed and awarded the painting to Michael. The stepmother appealed. Did Victor Gruen make a valid gift inter vivos of the Klimt painting to his son Michael? Gruen v. Gruen, 68 N.Y.2d 48, 496 N.E.2d 869, 505 N.Y.S.2d 849, Web 1986 N.Y. Lexis 19366 (Court of Appeals of New York)

Q 37.5) Police officers of the city of Miami, Florida, responded to reports of a shooting at the apartment of Carlos Fuentes. Fuentes had been shot in the neck and shoulder, and shortly after the police arrived, he was removed to a hospital. In an ensuing search of the apartment, the police found assorted drug paraphernalia, a gun, and cash in the amount of $58,591. The property was seized, taken to the police station, and placed in custody. About nine days later, the police learned that Fuentes had been discharged from the hospital. All efforts by police to locate Fuentes and his girlfriend, a co-occupant of Fuentes’s apartment, were unsuccessful. Neither Fuentes nor his girlfriend ever came forward to claim any of the items taken by the police from his apartment. About four years later, James W. Green and Walter J. Vogel, the owners of the apartment building in which Fuentes was a tenant, sued the city of Miami to recover the cash found in Fuentes’s apartment. The state of Florida intervened in the case, also claiming an interest in the money. Who wins? State of Florida v. Green, 456 So.2d 1309, Web 1984 Fla.App. Lexis 15340 (Court of Appeal of Florida)