A legal bid to reverse the sale of the Haruvi real estate empire is alive once again.
Michelle Haruvi was able to revive her case against her father and his business partner on appeal and now hopes to add more defendants to the suit.
An appellate court decided in December to reverse a lower court’s wholesale dismissal of the case. The move is the latest in a multi-year saga involving a 500-unit New York apartment portfolio.
Michelle Haruvi is the daughter of Arthur Haruvi, both of whom had a stake in a seven-building Manhattan real estate portfolio. When Arthur and his brother Abe reorganized the holdings in the midst of Covid, a $165 million deal netted Abe a $80 million payout and brought in landlord Peter Hungerford to manage the Manhattan properties.
Michelle claims she was blindsided by the decision and sued her father and Hungerford in 2022.
Last January, a court dismissed her suit in its entirety, saying the transaction was not substantial enough to require notifying her under the law. Michelle appealed that decision.
The appellate court agreed with Michelle that the sale of the portfolio was both significant and unusual enough to make it subject to a law requiring notification of shareholders. However, there are still questions about whether the law was indeed broken and how events unfolded, the appellate court said.
Michelle is now looking to add additional parties, including her sister Aileen Haruvi, to the suit. Michelle alleges that Aileen and others harmed the value of the portfolio and joined defendants in a campaign of intimidation against her, attempting to evict her from a New York apartment owned by her father. The eviction case against Michelle was dismissed separately by a housing court.
A lower court found that Hungerford could not be held personally liable in the case, but the appellate court reversed that decision as well.
Hungerford alleges Michelle Haruvi was well aware of what was happening prior to the sale, and that she has been offered $5 million to let the issue go.
“She has no other points of leverage,” he said. “This is all about $5 million and she won’t take it. So I find that very interesting and even bizarre and irrational.”
Lawyers for Michelle Haruvi declined to comment. A lawyer for the defendants did not respond to a request for comment by press time. Aileen Haruvi could not be reached for comment.
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