Katy Perry and Orlando Bloom's latest real estate headache: Why there's a trial over their $15M deal
Katy Perry and Orlando Bloom inked a deal to buy a $15 million mansion in Santa Barbara, Calif., in 2020 — and it has spawned a three-year legal battle. It's finally going to be hashed out in a Los Angeles court, with a trial beginning on Sept. 27.
Why are Katy and Orlando involved in a trial?
Carl Westcott, an 83-year-old entrepreneur who founded businesses including 1-800-Flowers, and the couple's business manager, Bernie Gudvi, are the two parties involved in the lawsuit. Westcott claims the deal — brokered by Gudvi — to sell the home to the star couple took place as he recovered from surgery and was on "several intoxicating pain-killing opiates," leaving him "of unsound mind," per court documents obtained by the Los Angeles Times. When he tried to back out of the deal a week later, Perry, 38, and Bloom, 46 — who are not named as parties in the suit — wouldn't let him.
Dispute centers on whether the seller was too 'intoxicated' to ink the deal to sell the 9,300-square-foot Santa Barbara mansion
Westcott, an Army veteran, had a six-hour back surgery several days before he signed the real estate contract in July 2020, leaving him "intoxicated," according to his complaint. He further cited "frailty from advanced age and poor heath from Huntington's disease" as reasons for not being in the right mind at the time he entered into the residential sale agreement.
The week after the agreement was signed — for the 9,300-square-foot home, which boasts eight bedrooms and 11 bathrooms — Westcott began to "feel mentally clear again." He sent a letter to Berkshire Hathaway, the business overseeing the real estate transaction for the seller and buyer, saying he changed his mind. The American Idol judge and the Carnival Row actor — who at one month away from welcoming their first child, Daisy Dove, together — allegedly replied that they were "not willing to walk away" from purchasing the home, which they fell in love with, and that Westcott was "obligated to complete the sale."
Westcott — who also claims Gudvi didn't deliver a check from Bloom and Perry for $450,000 within three days, which was to serve as an initial deposit — wants a cancellation of the sale and compensation for legal fees.
It's unclear who currently resides in the house, according to the L.A. Times. Perry and Bloom purchased a compound in nearby Montecito months later for $14.2 million. That house is a 7,200-square-foot home with six bedrooms and 12 bathrooms. At the time, People reported Perry, who grew up in Santa Barbara, was thrilled to raise their daughter in Montecito and they were "excited" about their new house, which came with "a lot of history and a gorgeous ocean view."
What we know about the trial — so far
The trial was to begin on Aug. 21, but it has been postponed to Sept. 27. It will take place at the Stanley Mosk Courthouse, where Britney Spears's hearings were held in her conservatorship case. It will be a nonjury trial, and Judge Lipner is expected to preside.
The parties are to submit their pretrial witness and exhibit lists by Sept. 8. The final conference before the hearing is set for Sept. 15.
It's unclear whether or not Perry and Bloom will be in court to support their business manager.
This isn't Perry's 1st real estate battle
In 2014, the "I Kissed a Girl" singer made a deal to purchase a convent in Los Angeles's Los Feliz neighborhood for $14.5 million, but it turned into a real estate battle royale with the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Archbishop José Gómez, representing the L.A. Catholic Archdiocese, agreed to the sale without the OK from the sisters. However, the sisters cited ownership because their order purchased the house for $600,000 (with financial help from the seller).
Two of the five nuns who still resided in the convent, Sisters Catherine Rose Holzman and Rita Callanan, refused to sell to Perry, telling the press at the time that it would be a "sin." Perry, a daughter of evangelical Christian preachers, met with the nuns and tried to sway them by singing "Oh Happy Day" and showing them her Jesus tattoo. However, the nuns made their own deal to sell the property they believed they owned — selling it to restaurateur and developer Dana Hollister.
The archdiocese and Perry sued Hollister, and her purchase was invalidated in 2015. In 2017, a jury found that Hollister intentionally interfered with Perry's legal purchase and ordered her to pay $6.5 million in damages to Perry and the archdiocese. Hollister was in bankruptcy court in 2018, stemming from the lawsuit, and one of the nuns who was there to support her — Holzman — died in the courtroom. The sale of the house ended up falling through.
