A Texas millionaire has been ordered to repay $3 million worth of Katy Perry’s legal fees after losing to the pop star in a yearslong legal battle over a California mansion sale.
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In a Thursday (May 28) court order, obtained and first reported by Billboard, a Los Angeles judge said Perry is entitled to an attorney fee refund on top of the $2 million judgment she already won from 1800Flowers founder Carl Westcott. Perry, through her business manager Bernie Gudvi, spent five years fighting in court over a $15 million contract for Westcott’s 9,285-square-foot home in Montecito, Calif.
Judge Joseph Lipner ruled in January that Westcott improperly tried to back out of the deal by claiming, without evidence, that he was not in his right mind when he inked the sales contract because of painkillers from a recent back surgery. On Thursday, the judge said this also means Gudvi and Perry are entitled to recover legal expenses for their troubles.
However, Judge Lipner did not grant the full $4.5 million in fees sought by Gudvi and Perry for nearly 5,000 billable hours of work by more than a dozen attorneys at the elite law firm Greenberg Traurig. That figure, said the judge, is “extremely high for a case of this nature.”
“There is nothing wrong with Gudvi agreeing to pay these fees,” wrote Judge Lipner. “Nor is there anything improper about Gudvi and his counsel agreeing to staff the case so heavily with attorneys and have them spend thousands of hours litigating. As Gudvi pointed out, Gudvi represents the interests of a celebrity client, Elizabeth Hudson, also known as Katy Perry. Gudvi and his principal have the resources to litigate the case in this manner and may appropriately choose to do so. The problems arise when a party seeks to shift those fees to the other party who did not make those choices.”
The judge thus ordered Westcott to repay a lower figure of $3 million in legal fees. This amount will now get added to the complex balance sheet between the adversaries; Perry’s reps have already paid $9 million to Westcott out of the original $15 million purchase price of the Montecito home, and Judge Lipner deducted $2 million from the remaining $6 million balance as Westcott’s penalty in the January judgment.
Reps for Perry and Westcott did not immediately return requests for comment on Thursday’s ruling.
The saga dates back to July 2020, when Gudvi signed a contract on Perry’s behalf to buy the Montecito home that Westcott had recently purchased. A month later, Westcott sued to invalidate the deal, alleging he had been too foggy from painkillers to properly consent.
The case went to a bench trial in 2023, and Judge Lipner ruled that Westcott was indeed in his right mind when he made the deal. Among other things, the judge noted that Westcott was cogent in communications with a real estate agent and had rejected a lower offer from former California first lady Maria Shriver just days before selling to Perry.
A second-phase trial was held to determine damages last year, and Judge Lipner ultimately awarded $2 million to Perry’s team. This number accounts for the money Perry could have earned if she’d been able to rent out the Montecito house during the yearslong legal battle when it was sitting empty.
Westcott is appealing the judgment.
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