David Geffen’s Co-op Penthouse Keeps on Giving – to Lawyers

After receiving dozens of complaints from his fellow shareholders and getting sued for $2.5 million, entertainment mogul David Geffen has struck back – by suing two construction companies involved in the never-ending renovation of his Fifth Avenue penthouse apartment, the New York Post reports.

Geffen’s insurance company, AIG, filed suit Monday in Manhattan Supreme Court against Bernsohn & Fetner and Paul Ryan Associated, claiming the contractors caused more than $1 million in damages to his co-op apartment when water leaked from drain pipes on the roof.

This is a story only a lawyer could love. It started back in 2012, when Geffen paid $54 million for the 17th, 18th and 19th floors of the luxury co-op at Fifth Avenue and East 60th Street. Renovation began in 2015, and in the spring of the following year two of Geffen’s downstairs neighbors, the septuagenarians Howard and Gloria Schwartz, sued Geffen for $2 million plus $500,000 in attorneys’ fees, claiming the renovation had caused cracks in their walls, soot in their apartment, and assorted health problems. The Schwartzes’ lawsuit was one of 17 shareholder complaints filed over the renovation project.

Geffen’s lawyer then filed papers asking a judge to strike “scandalous and prejudicial” language from the suit, including references to the construction as a “gut renovation,” and to the Schwartzes as “senior citizens.” The Schwartzes’ attorney, Steven Sladkus of Schwartz Sladkus Reich Greenberg Atlas, said at the time, “I’m stunned by the silliness of the motion. All it serves to do is increase costs.”

The Benjamins just keep coming, with no sign they'll stop anytime soon.