The U.S. District Court in Manhattan has ruled that the Metropolitan Museum of Art can hold onto a famed Picasso painting titled “The Actor” that was sold by its Jewish owners as they fled Nazi Germany. Time was the deciding factor. According to the judge, too much time had elapsed before the great-grandniece of original owner and German-Jewish businessman Paul Leffman insisted that it be returned. A mitigating factor in the decision was that the painting was not unlawfully appropriated during the Nazi era.

Leffman and his family fled Nazi Germany for Italy in 1937, but found that Nazi and Fascist policies were rapidly encroaching. Desperate to escape to Switzerland, Paul Leffman sold the Picasso painting in 1938 for $12,000 to the art dealer Kate Perls, who was acting on behalf of Hugo Perls and Paul Rosenberg. The American collector Thelma Chrysler Foy bought the painting in 1941 for $22,500, and donated it to the museum in 1952. The painting is valued today at $100 million.

“We are appreciative that the court ruling enables the continued public display of this work,” a Met spokesman said in a statement.