Someone always has to chime in with the “I don’t see why you’re complaining: they’ve got every right to do what they did,” defence. Which completely misses the point: it’s not can they do this, it’s should they do this? This is usually made perfectly clear by actually reading the other posts in the thread. It’s right there in the OP: “I don’t dispute the legality of the Academy’s right to buy back any Oscars for $1, but do you think it’s a fair stipulation?”
And yes, the original statue was found, but only after the daughter was forced to sign another contract in case the original was recovered. Again, something you would already know if you had actually bothered to read the thread.
And, though I don’t have a cite, I’m pretty sure the agreement states somethingmore to the effect of “the statue may not be sold unless OFFERED to the Academy first at the price of $1.00”.
I’m fairly certain the Academy may decline to buyback the statue and let the owner do with it what they may. In fact, I thought I read once they did in fact decline the buyback offer, because they got a lot of flack (as in the above posts).
<went off to Google it…>
Yeah, here we go: “AMPAS will buy back an Oscar from the recipient for $1. To date, about half a dozen Oscars have been sold, none to AMPAS.” That’s from this article which gives a good bit of information. Scroll down to “What exactly is an Oscar” for some neat info.