Decision no. 622/2010

In 1938, the requested properties, the majority of which were situated in Vienna, were owned by Arnold and Margit L., Eduard and Gisela S., Alois S. and Max. S. They were all considered Jews in accordance with the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, which were introduced to Austria after the Anschluss, and were subjected to persecution by the National Socialist regime.

The late applicant Helga S. was the daughter of Arnold and Margit L. She was able to emigrate to the USA with her parents in late 1938. A trustee appointed by the State Commissioner for Private Enterprises sold all nine Vienna properties of Arnold and Margit L. in 1938/1939.

Margit L. was the daughter of Eduard and Gisela S., who, in addition to a property in Vienna, Döbling, were also the owners of development zones in Tullnerbach. In 1939/1940, they sold most of these properties to private persons, while in 1943, two property parcels were transferred into the ownership of the Municipality of Tullnerbach as public road areas. Eduard S., who died in 1940, was also the co-owner with his brother Alois of a property in Vienna, Mariahilf, which was sold to the German Reich through a trustee in 1942, and of a theater in Vienna, Landstraße, which was sold to the City of Vienna in 1938.

Max S., a brother of Eduard and Alois S. was the co-owner of a property in the first district of Vienna and a property in Klosterneuburg. His share of the first-mentioned property was sold by a trustee in 1940 to a publishing house affiliated with the National Socialist German Workers' Party. Max S. sold his property in Klosterneuburg in the same year.

After the collapse of the National Socialist regime, Margit L., (as the heir of her husband Arnold L., who had died in 1940 in New York and as the joint heir of her late parents Gisela and Eduard S. and of her late uncle Alois S.) and Anna S. (as the heir of her husband Max S., who had died in 1943) filed applications for restitution of those properties which were the subject of the application for in rem restitution filed with the Arbitration Panel by Helga S.

In April 1957 and December 1949, Anna S. concluded settlements regarding the property in the first district of Vienna and the property in Klosterneuburg and waived in rem restitution in favor of a settlement payment. With regard to these two properties, the Arbitration Panel reached the conclusion that the applicant was not entitled to inherit from the original owner Max S. The application for restitution of these properties was therefore to be rejected by the Arbitration Panel.

Eight of the remaining requested properties/property shares were restituted to Margit L. and/or her co-heirs between 1949 and 1953. They were subsequently sold on by Margit L. Margit L. concluded settlements concerning the other three properties, thus waiving their restitution in exchange for settlement payments. Nine of these properties were privately-owned on the cut off day, 17 January 2001. Therefore, a fundamental requirement for an in rem restitution pursuant to the Entschädigungsfondsgesetz ("General Settlement Fund Law – GSF Law") was not fulfilled.

Two properties in Vienna, Mariahilf and Wieden, were publicly-owned (City of Vienna) on the cut off day. As these properties had already been restituted to Margit L. in their entirety after 1945 and she had subsequently sold them on, the Arbitration Panel was unable to pronounce a recommendation for their renewed restitution.

The majority of the requested properties in Tullnerbach were privately-owned on the cut off day. One of the two property parcels which had been partitioned off was owned on the cut off day by the Market Town Tullerbach, which, however, has not affiliated itself with the proceedings of the Arbitration Panel. Furthermore, the Arbitration Panel determined that this property area, upon request of Gisela S. and on the basis of a valid parcellation plan of 1895, had been transferred into the ownership of the Municipality of Tullnerbach in 1943. The transfer of ownership in 1943 did therefore not constitute a seizure pursuant to the GSF Law.