David Copperfield, one of the most famous (and definitely the wealthiest) magicians alive, is known for feats over the course of his career, including making the Statue of Liberty disappear and walking through the Great Wall of China. Now, a lawsuit reveals that his magic skills do not seem to extend to good housekeeping.
Copperfield is facing a lawsuit from The Galleria in Manhattan, a condo where he owns a $7 million quadruplex penthouse. The suit claims that Copperfield’s luxury apartment has been allowed to “devolve into a state of… dilapidation.” Incredibly, the lawsuit cites warnings from architects that the condition of the penthouse is so bad that it could actually harm the building’s entire structure. It accuses Copperfield of causing some $3 million in damage to the home, as well as to the homes of other surrounding tenants.
The suit claims that Copperfield moved out of the “formerly pristine multilevel penthouse” and left it “trashed” and in an “appalling” state. Copperfield still owns the unit, and the suit states that the reason it’s been left in such a condition “is entirely unclear, especially when he still owns the Unit and is marketing it for sale.” That said, the unit does not appear to be currently listed for sale, at least not publicly.
Claudia Schiffer and David Copperfield in 1993 (Photos by Vinnie Zuffante/Getty Images)
Copperfield “refuses to confront the consequences of his actions and denies all responsibility for the damage he has caused to the building and his former neighbors,” the suit goes on to say. Photos of the penthouse taken by the New York State Supreme Court do indeed seem to show it in extremely poor condition, with the most serious damage stemming from an indoor pool bursting in 2015. The complaint alleges this happened due to Copperfield’s “illegal and ineffective plastic plumbing fixtures” in the pool. Three years later, says the lawsuit, “Copperfield abandoned the Unit, stripping it of its furniture and fixtures.” But a spokesperson for Copperfield says the photos don’t tell the whole story:
“This is a simple insurance claim. The photographs included in the lawsuit don’t reflect the current state of the apartment. This is a court matter and will be handled in court.”
Whether or not that’s the case, the lawsuit makes clear that Copperfield has been at odds with The Galleria almost from the moment he moved in. Since purchasing the quadruplex unit in 1997 for a little over $7 million, Copperfield has allegedly been a “far cry from a model resident,” per the complaint. It says he “notoriously jam packed the Unit with novelties such as fortune telling machines, classic arcade games and other, more bizarre items like ‘hazing devices’ apparently used by various fraternities during the turn of the century.” In 2009, a fire code violation due to the unit’s private elevator allegedly incurred undisclosed penalties and fines, and Copperfield is stated in the lawsuit to have repeatedly ignored a necessary window repair.
But it was allegedly in 2018 that the penthouse sank into really unconscionable depths, per the complaint:
“Copperfield abandoned the Unit, stripping it of its furniture and fixtures…Since then, Copperfield has let the Unit devolve into a state of complete dilapidation…To say that he trashed the Unit is an understatement. The pictures of the Unit are appalling and speak for themselves.”
The board at The Galleria hired an architect to assess the condition of the penthouse, and it found such details as unchecked debris forming an “active safety risk,” pipes nearly burst, bad wiring not up to safety codes, “large quantities of unattended combustible materials,” among other problems. According to the report, the unit’s “current conditions pose potential safety and health hazards and should not remain within an occupied building.” And the response from Copperfield to this information, the board complains, seems to have been largely sleight-of-hand:
“In response, Copperfield at most caused band-aid repairs to be performed to some of the purely cosmetic issues identified by [the report]…Several of the more significant and dangerous issues such as subsurface decay/damage, structural stability, and mold growth remain unaddressed.”
The board says that still more work needs to be done to discover the true amount of damage in the penthouse that will need to be repaired and is attempting to reserve the right to go back and amend the lawsuit in view of “newly estimated repair costs arising from Copperfield’s destruction of his Unit and wanton disregard of his duty of care to the Condominium, the terms of the Condominium’s governing documents, and basic decency.”
They’re seeking $7.5 million in damages, with still more punitive damages and legal fees still to be determined.
It’s worth noting that Copperfield, who happens to be probably the only billionaire in the history of stage magic, has an almost unbelievable real estate portfolio to his name, one which reportedly includes no fewer than 11 private islands. But even with all that property it is somewhat baffling to think that this particular penthouse was allowed to reach such a condition as alleged by the lawsuit.