A federal judge has dismissed UMB Bank’s civil racketeering claims against the daughter and grandchildren of famed Kansas City artist Thomas Hart Benton, even as two parallel cases over the Benton estate heat up.
Chief U.S. District Judge Beth Phillips ruled on Wednesday that Kansas City-based UMB failed to meet the elements of a racketeering case, saying its lawsuit was at bottom a malicious prosecution case.
Until recently, UMB Bank served as trustee of the Benton estate. The bank claimed that the Benton defendants — Jessie Lyman and her children — hatched a scheme to force UMB to liquidate Benton’s artworks because they were living on a commune whose financial needs necessitated the artworks' sale.
As part of that scheme, UMB alleged, Benton’s heirs made false accusations to media outlets — including the Wall Street Journal, The Kansas City Star and KCUR — that the bank failed to keep proper records, sold Benton artworks below their market value, engaged in improper self-dealing and in general mismanaged the Benton estate.
Benton’s heirs made those allegations in a lawsuit it filed in Jackson County Probate Court in December 2019, touching off a tit-for-tat legal battle. The probate lawsuit, which is pending, prompted UMB to file its own action in federal court accusing Lyman and her children of civil racketeering under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO.
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