Courtesy of The Associated Press
Kobe Bryant is in a court battle to try to keep his mother from auctioning off mementoes from his high school days in Pennsylvania and his early years with the Los Angeles Lakers.
A New Jersey auction house filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Camden on Thursday for the right to sell the stuff after the NBA star’s lawyers wrote the firm telling it to cancel a planned June auction.
The disagreement is a high-value, high-profile version of a question many families face: Can Mom get rid of the stuff a grown child left at home?
In this case, the 900 mementoes happen to be worth upward of $1.5 million.
Among the first 100 or so items Pamela Bryant intends to sell: the NBA star’s jerseys, practice gear and sweatsuits from Lower Merion High School; varsity letters; a trophy for being the outstanding player at the 1995 Adidas ABCD basketball camp; and a signed basketball from the 2000 NBA championship game.
And then there are rings, for the 1996 Pennsylvania high school championship, a pair that the Lakers made for Bryant’s parents for the 2000 NBA championship and one from the 1998 NBA All-Star game.
According to court filings, Pamela Bryant struck a deal in January with Goldin Auctions in Berlin, N.J., which earlier this year sold a rare Honus Wagner baseball card for a record $2.1 million.
