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magician David Copperfield Allowing his millions Manhattan The apartment “fell into a state of serious disrepair”. architect This could actually threaten the structural integrity of the entire building, it warned.
That’s according to a jaw-dropping lawsuit filed Tuesday by the board of directors of The Galleria, an East 57th Street condo, which alleges that the 67-year-old Copperfield — the world’s highest-paid magician — caused about $3 million worth of damage not only to his own “once-immaculate multi-story penthouse,” but also to other tenants’ homes.
The indictment alleges that Copperfield “destroyed” the home, which he no longer lived in but still owned, leaving it in “appalling” condition. The indictment says his motive for destroying his apartment and leaving it to decay is “entirely unclear, especially when he still owned the unit and was selling it.”
While the situation posed a potential health hazard in addition to causing structural damage, the complaint states Copperfield “refuses to accept the consequences of his actions and denies all responsibility for the damage he caused to the building and its former neighbors.”
Joshua Stricoff, an attorney who filed the lawsuit on behalf of The Galleria, said independent He added nothing that was not in the complaint, and the allegations and photos of the crashed plane included in the court documents did not require further explanation.
In an email sent after this article was published, a representative for David Copperfield said: “This is a simple insurance claim. The photos included in the lawsuit do not reflect the current condition of the apartment. This is a forensic matter and will be handled by the court.”
Born David Kotkin in Metachen, New Jersey, Copperfield began performing at age 12 under the stage name “Davino the Young Magician.” Since then, Copperfield has won 21 Emmy Awards, been named “King of Magic” by the Society of American Magicians, and received the “Living Legend Award” from the Library of Congress.
He owns 11 private islands and his face appears on stamps issued by Guyana, Dominica, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, among others. Recently accused of sexual assaultan allegation he strongly denied and Linked to late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
Copperfield’s four-story, 15,000-square-foot apartment on the 54th floor of the building, which features an indoor pool, is made up of two penthouses that were originally combined into a “dream house” in the mid-1970s. General Motors Heir Stuart Rawlings Mott. In 1991, The Galleria was again in the news when Eric Clapton’s 4-year-old son fell to his death from an open window on the 53rd floor.
The complaint alleges that Copperfield purchased the apartment in 1997 for $7.4 million and that it was large and had dedicated heating, ventilation, electricity and hot water systems. Because other tenants did not use those systems, the complaint alleges, the condo bylaws made it the condo owner’s responsibility to maintain and repair them.
From the beginning, Copperfield was “a troublemaker” in the building, the complaint goes on to say, describing him as “far from a model resident.” After taking possession of the massive penthouse, the complaint alleges, Copperfield “infamously filled the apartment with novelties such as fortune-telling machines, classic arcade games, and other, more bizarre items such as ‘hazing devices’ that were allegedly used by various fraternities at the turn of the century.”
The question Copperfield subsequently raises “is a major and ongoing question—in Page 6 and other places — for a considerable period of time,” the complaint states.
In 2009, Copperfield’s private elevator allegedly violated New York City Department of Buildings regulations, resulting in an undisclosed amount of fines from the condo board.
In 2015, Copperfield’s indoor pool burst, which the complaint said was caused by the magician’s use of an “illegal and ineffective plastic plumbing fixture.” The water poured through the building, damaging elevators and apartments below the 30th floor, the complaint said.
In 2017, Copperfield “once again pushed the condominium to the brink of litigation” after he ignored requests for window repairs for years, the complaint said.
But the following year, things reportedly took a surreal turn.
According to the complaint, in 2018, “Copperfield abandoned the apartment and removed the furniture and fixtures therein.”
“Since that time, Copperfield has allowed the unit to fall into a state of complete disrepair. To say he destroyed the unit is an understatement. The photographs of the unit are appalling and speak for themselves,” the indictment states.
Once the condo board discovered the condition of the Copperfield apartment, it immediately hired an architectural firm to assess the damage, according to the complaint. The architects summarized their findings in a March 10 report that the board said “confirmed (their) worst fears.”
Severe flooding threatened the building’s concrete structure; internal flooding led to mold growth “so severe it masked underlying problems”; skylights and woodwork leaked; falling debris was an “active safety risk” to anyone entering the space; pipes were about to burst; gas leak protection was inadequate; shoddy electrical work did not meet code; bathrooms had “varying levels of contamination” and “large quantities of unattended combustible materials.” The architect’s report said the apartment “presented a potential safety and health hazard in its current condition and should not remain in an occupied building.”
The condo board said it sent the architect’s report to Copperfield’s lawyers, but “to no avail.”
“In response, Copperfield has made at best temporary repairs to some of the purely cosmetic issues noted in the report. Some of the more significant and dangerous issues, such as sub-grade rot/damage, structural stability, and mold growth, remain unaddressed,” the complaint states.
According to the complaint, the commission learned that when Copperfield moved out in 2018, he fired the house manager, housekeeper and handyman who were responsible for maintaining the unit’s specialized mechanical equipment.
From that point on, “unbeknownst to the board,” no one was tending to any of the equipment, leading to a valve failure in the Copperfield mechanical room that “caught the building management off guard” on Dec. 27, 2023. This resulted in flooding of various apartments, elevator shafts, hallways and other locations, requiring approximately $3 million in repairs, the complaint states.
Copperfield and his insurance company told the condo board that he and his staff were unaware of the existence of the mechanical room or their obligation to maintain it, but the complaint dismisses that assertion as fiction because they had been responsible for those duties for years.
The board still doesn’t know the extent of the damage Copperfield has caused, but believes that “the extent of decay Copperfield has allowed to occur within its units may have penetrated into the ground.” The board went on to find more damage, and in its complaint, it said it “reserves all rights” to amend the document to include “new estimated repair costs resulting from Copperfield’s vandalism of its units and its wanton disregard for its duty of care to the condominium, the terms of the condominium’s governing documents, and basic decency.”
In short, the complaint concluded: “Copperfield must be held accountable for his misconduct.”
The condo board is seeking a total of $7.5 million in damages, plus undetermined punitive damages and legal fees.
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