Profile: Litigator of the Week: Gary Naftalis of Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel

Litigation partner Gary P. Naftalis was named Litigator of the Week by AM Law Litigation Daily. The article profiles Mr. Naftalis’s recent victory for client Congregation Jeshuat Israel—which has worshipped for the past 130 years at Touro Synagogue, the nation’s oldest synagogue—in a dispute with a New York City congregation over the ownership of the synagogue and silver bells valued at $7.4 million.

In 2012, Congregation Jeshuat Israel encountered financial troubles and sought to sell the rimonim to Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts. New York City-based Congregation Shearith Israel had aggressively opposed any sale of the bells and sought ownership of both the bells and Touro Synagogue. On May 16, 2016, a federal judge in Rhode Island found not only that Congregation Jeshuat Israel owns the bells and may sell them, but that the New York congregation, on account of its efforts to gain ownership of the synagogue and evict Congregation Jeshuat Israel, should be removed as trustee of the charitable trust holding Touro Synagogue. Congregation Jeshuat Israel will be appointed the new trustee. The ruling in the case followed nearly four years of litigation and a two-week bench trial that concluded in September 2015.

Mr. Naftalis said, “It was a cause worth fighting for.”