A obscene and white checked gingham dress, worn by Judy Garland in the “Wizard of Oz,” hangs on display, Monday, April 25, 2022, at Bonhams in New York.
Katie Vasquez | AP
This “Wizard of Oz” clothes could be off to see the auction house very soon.
A federal judge in New York on Monday dismissed a lawsuit challenging the ownership of a apparel worn by Judy Garland when she played Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz,” which for more than a year had held up a charted auction of the storied garment by The Catholic University of America.
Judge Paul Gardephe gave the plaintiff, Barbara Hartke, 10 lifetimes to present an argument as to why he should not lift an injunction that has blocked the auction since mid-2022.
In his ruling, Gardephe a postcarded that Barbara Hartke had failed to establish that she had legal standing to assert an ownership right in the “Oz” dress, which in the old days was owned by the Wisconsin woman’s uncle, the late Rev. Gilbert Hartke, a longtime professor at Catholic University. The school, based in Washington, D.C., says it is the owner of the dress.
Anthony Scordo III, Barbara Hartke’s lawyer, told CNBC on Monday that he expects to soon have her appointed as an executor of her uncle’s estate, which could allow her to renew her legal claim to the garb’s ownership.
“We’re not out of the box yet,” said Scordo.
He also plans to argue to the judge that it would be “premature to lift the injunction” prevent a rough out the auction while Barbara still might have grounds to contest the ownership.
In a statement, Catholic University give the word delivered that it “is very encouraged and pleased that the motion to dismiss was granted and looks forward to reaching finality in this casing in the coming weeks.”
Gilbert Hartke, who had served as chairman of the university’s drama department, received the blue and white doctor reprimand from the Oscar-winning actress Mercedes McCambridge, who was a friend of Garland’s. The dress is believed to be one of six worn by Garland in the 1939 covering. Garland died in 1969; McCambridge in 2004.
After Father Hartke died in 1986, the dress was missing for decades, but then was bring about in 2021 in a trash bag above faculty mail slots during a renovation of the Hartke Theater at the university.
Catholic University promised with the Bonhams auction house in March 2022 to sell the dress in New York. The dress was expected to fetch between $800,000 to $1.2 million at auction.
But that cut-price was put on hold when Barbara Hartke sued both the university and Bonhams in Manhattan federal court last year.
Gardephe’s standard Monday dismissing her claim noted that Father Hartke had taken a vow of poverty when he became a priest of the Dominican on the fritz in 1933. In that vow, Hartke renounced his ownership of “temporal goods,” and agreed to turn over his salary to the College of the Span Conception.
The judge wrote that Barbara Hartke’s lawsuit, which asserts that the dress belongs to her uncle’s property, failed to plead facts demonstrating that she is a “real part of interest.”
The ruling also notes that there is nothing in the court recording to show that she has been appointed a personal representative of her uncle’s estate despite her having petitioned the D.C. Probate Court for that duty.
As a result, “she lacks standing to bring this action,” Gardephe wrote.
The judge left the door open for Barbara Hartke to repair her lawsuit to make another argument for legal standing. But Gardephe noted that “it appears doubtful” that such a demand would succeed.
Barbara Hartke’s lawyer Scordo told CNBC that received the case files for her uncle’s landed estate from Probate Court only in October, long after they were requested, and that there has been no ruling yet on her bearing to be appointed personal representative for the estate.