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Battle over gold coins goes on and on

The Third Circuit of Appeals vacated a ruling yesterday that would have returned rare, valuable coins to family that’s been fighting for them.

THE LANGBORD FAMILY was poised to get back a pot of gold coins, but the paperwork rainbow never ends.

The Third Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday vacated its April ruling that would have forced the U.S. Treasury Department to return 10 rare $20 "double eagles" that Joan Langbord and her sons found in a safe deposit box in 2003.

The family took the coins to the U.S. Mint on Independence Mall for authentication and learned they were the real thing - coins that could fetch a whopping $80 million at auction.

The Feds wouldn't give them back or strike a deal to split the proceeds with the family because they claimed Joan Langbord's father, Israel Switt, a Philly merchant and coin dealer, had helped a Mint cashier steal the double eagles.

The Langbords sued and lost in a trial to get them back in 2011. The story's played out in a series of never-ending appeals that continued yesterday with the latest reversal. Chief Judge Theodore McKee ruled that the case be reheard by the court en banc, which means the Third Circuit's entire bench of judges will hear the case before the end of the year.

Barry Berke, an attorney representing the Langbord family, did not return requests for comment. First Assistant U.S. Attorney Louis Lappen said the government was "pleased" with the decision.

There were 455,500 double eagle coins minted in Philadelphia in 1933, but never circulated because President Franklin D. Roosevelt scrapped the gold standard. He ordered all but two of the coins melted into bullion. The two saved were sent to the Smithsonian Institute. Others, obviously, escaped.

In 2001, according to court documents, the government reached a deal with the owner of an escaped double eagle that had once been purchased by King Farouk I of Egypt. That coin was sold at auction for $7.6 million and the money was split between the owner and the government.