WASHINGTON, November 20 (RIA Novosti) – An armored car that once belonged to Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and is currently on display in a US museum is at the center of an international legal battle as the Bulgarian government claims it was stolen and wants it back, a Chicago television station reported.
Historic Auto Attractions owner Wayne Lensing told ABC7 news that he purchased the 1937 Packard Super 12 for his Roscoe, Illinois-based museum after seeing it for sale on auction website eBay.
Today the car is worth “millions,” ABC7 news reported Tuesday, citing US court documents.
The legal battle began in 2011 when US federal agents arrived at the museum to confiscate the vehicle, after the Bulgarian government complained it had been stolen from a museum outside the capital city Sofia in 1992.
Bulgarian officials say the Detroit-built Packard, which has 3-inch-thick (76-mm) windows and weighs 15,000 pounds (6800 kg) was a gift to a Bulgarian prime minister, and they are demanding its return under the terms of a 1970 treaty, ABC7 news reported.
Lensing told ABC7 news that he did not know the car was stolen and that it has a “clean Illinois title.” The car currently remains on display in his museum.
Bulgarian national Ivan Kristov, who according to US authorities was responsible for bringing Stalin’s car to the United States, told ABC7 news that his business partner who exported the car from Bulgaria is now dead.
Stoil Slavov was alleged to have had links to Russian crime and was blown up in a “gangland attack” shortly after the car was imported, ABC7 news reported.
"What's stolen? Stolen, I don't know, for me it's not stolen," Kristov told ABC7 news.
