In "Zuckerman v. Metropolitan Museum of Art" (2018), Preska ruled in favor of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, dismissing a lawsuit seeking the return of Picasso's painting "The Actor" to the heir of its original owners, Paul and Alice Leffmann. The Leffmanns were a German Jewish couple who sold the painting in 1938 to finance their flight from Nazis. The painting was acquired by the Met in 1952. Preska ruled that the Leffmanns' heir could not show, under New York law, that the painting was sold under duress. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the dismissal on the ground that the claim was raised too late (72 years after the work was sold and 58 years after it was donated to the art museum).