Real estate mogul saves $50M home as jury clears him of battery
EXCLUSIVE: How owner of 30 Manhattan buildings was almost ruined when ‘lying’ wife said he ‘pulled, scratched and punched’ her during fight over cellphone so she could grab his waterfront Palm Beach mansion under prenup from hell
- Abe Haruvi would have been on the hook to give his wife some $60 million if he had been found guilty of hitting and scratching her during a tussle over a phone
- But the jury in Palm Beach, Florida, cleared Haruvi, 67, after just half an hour’s deliberation
- Haruvi and Brazilian wife Giovana Stephenson signed a prenup that said she would get their $50 million waterfront home plus $8 million cash if he was convicted of hitting her
- Stephenson, 57, ‘had 60 million reasons to lie that a battery occurred’ Haruvi’s attorney wrote in court papers
- ‘I guess when you are young and in love you don’t imagine things going wrong and your spouse accusing you like this,’ added lawyer Cyrus Toufanian
- Neither has yet filed for divorce but Stephenson’s attorney says their marriage is ‘not salvageable’
- Haruvi and his older brother Arthur own more than 30 Manhattan with 500 apartments mainly on the tony Upper East and Upper West Sides of Manhattan
A jury’s decision has saved one of Manhattan’s biggest real estate moguls a massive $60 million by acquitting him of hitting and scratching his wife, DailyMail.com has learned exclusively.
Abe Haruvi who co-owns some 500 rental condos in the Big Apple, would have had to give his Brazilian wife the enormous amount of money and real estate under an extraordinary pre-nuptial agreement that awarded her if he was ever found guilty of assaulting her but gave her nothing if he didn’t.
The jury in West Palm Beach, Florida, however, found Haruvi, 67, not guilty of battery against Giovana Stephenson, his wife, court papers show.
‘Justice prevailed,’ Haruvi’s ecstatic attorney Cyrus Toufanian told DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview.
Stephenson’s story grew like a ‘fisherman’s tale when the fish keeps getting bigger and bigger the more you tell it,’ the attorney added.
Haruvi and his older brother Arthur have a $200 million portfolio of properties in Manhattan. He and his wife Giovana dressed to impress at a dinner at Art Basel in Miami in 2015
The couple signed a prenup that would give Giovana some $60 million in cash and property if Abe cheated or hit her
The beachfront Palm Beach home they bought in 2011 for $7.8 million is now estimated to be worth around $50 million
‘First she said he had pulled her. Then when the police came she said he had pulled and scratched her. Then in court she said he had pulled and scratched and punched her.’
The July 6 decision was the second this year that went Haruvi’s way in his legal entanglements with his wife.
In March, a judge denied Stephenson’s attempt to obtain an injunction against domestic violence against Haruvi.
Haruvi, one of the biggest landlords on Manhattan’s tony Upper East and Upper West Sides, and his 57-year-old wife signed a custom-made pre-nuptial agreement just before they were married on June 12, 2008.
The document, published in part in court files, states that Stephenson would receive $8 million cash – rising to $16 million after their 17th anniversary in 2025 – their marital home and 50 percent of the couple’s jointly owned properties if they divorced in the wake of Haruvi getting convicted of ‘any battery that qualifies as a misdemeanor of the first degree or greater.’
Haruvi’s mug shot after he was arrested on suspicion of battery in December last year
That clause, according to Toufanian’s pleadings, gave his wife and mother of their three children the opportunity to take a sizeable bite out of the $200 million-real estate empire he owns with his older brother, Arthur.
‘It was a terrible prenup,’ attorney Touravian said in the interview. ‘It said if he committed infidelity or hit her she was entitled to this money. Abe did neither.
‘I guess when you are young and in love you don’t imagine things going wrong and your spouse accusing you like this.’
After Haruvi was arrested at the couple’s 18,000 sq. ft. waterfront Regency house on December 9, 2021, he was charged with first degree misdemeanor domestic battery, police and court records show – allowing Stephenson a chance to claim the huge fortune.
She accused him of assaulting her during a dispute over his cellphone, according to police records.
Police photos showed slight redness on the left side of the wife’s chest, but no injury was clearly visible.
It took the jury all of 30 minutes to agree unanimously to acquit Haruvi.
The pre-nuptial provision ‘crystalizes the insidious economic motivation behind the fabricated battery case,’ attorney Toufanian wrote.
‘The complainant,’ he added, ‘had 60 million reasons to lie that a battery occurred.’
According to the agreement if Stephenson were to divorce him she gets nothing unless he cheated or assaulted her.
‘If Giovana files for divorce and Abe has not been guilty of adultery or physical abuse as defined by this agreement, then Giovana shall receive no alimony or spousal support at the termination of the marriage, she shall receive no lump payments, and she further waives any ownership she would have in the marital home,’ the agreement read.
The couple rubbed shoulders with Gilligan’s Island star Tina Louise at an Andrea Bocelli concert at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago in 2010
Happier days. Abe Haruvi and his wife Giovana Stephenson were pictured at the Feather Ball at the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach in 2015
She would also get nothing from another property the couple owned in Palm Beach or two more in Loxahatchee, Florida.
As of July 15, neither Haruvi nor his wife had filed for divorce.
The couple’s Palm Beach home alone is worth around $50 million at today’s prices, Toufanian claimed in court files. The couple bought it jointly in 2011 for $7.8 million, public records show.
In addition to the trappings of extreme wealth, including a huge pool and several fountains, the five-bed, seven-bath house on Palm Beach’s preferred north side also features a dock for a yacht.
Several incidents led up to the battery charge, Toufanian contended in court.
In April 2019, according to a motion in the criminal case, Stephenson called police because she couldn’t find a diamond ring. She told cops who’d come to help her search that she wanted to get out of the marriage but couldn’t ‘due to a prenuptial agreement she had signed, according to court records.
The Haruvi brothers portfolio includes this building on Manhattan’s Upper West Side
The Haruvi brothers’ own some 500 apartments in Manhattan, mainly on the Upper East and Upper West sides
The couple’s prenup shows that Stephenson would get nothing in a divorce unless Haruvi cheated or hit her. The jury took just 30 minutes to decide he had not assaulted her
In April 2021, police were summoned to the house again. They had to call an ambulance when they were told that Haruvi’s mother-in-law fainted during dinner because of an argument about her living illegally at the couple’s house on an expired tourist visa from Brazil, which could have opened the family up to charges of harboring an illegal alien.
‘Abe’s wife and her mother faked a fainting spell and then called the police and blamed it on Abe,’ Toufanian wrote in court papers. ‘They both wanted to create a false impression Abe is temperamental and/or violent.
‘Miraculously as soon as the police left, the mother-in-law was fine. She did not go to the hospital, she did not go to the doctor, she did not even go to an urgent care clinic.’
Finally on December 9, ‘Abe’s wife used a verbal disagreement over a cellphone to fabricate a claim of battery,’ one of the case’s pleadings reads.
‘On that night, she screamed and exaggerated and created hysteria about the verbal disagreement causing the parties’ 12-year-old daughter to call 911. The police arrived within minutes. However, the wife took a video of herself before the police even got there, not for the police, but for the divorce case she was plotting to initiate to recover millions. The video shows no injury.’
Palm Beach police appeared unsure whether to arrest Haruvi, Toufanian contended.
‘Body camera footage reflects that one of the two police officers queried his supervisor as to the sufficiency of probable cause to make an arrest.
Cyrus Toufanian said Stephenson’s story grew like a fisherman’s tale when the fish gets bigger the more time it is told
‘But, the end result was that Abe was indeed arrested and taken to jail and charged with misdemeanor battery.’
Haruvi is the son of a Holocaust survivor who came to America ‘with nothing,’ according to the court file. He and his brother Arthur took over the family business from their father Jacob and increased their stronghold on Manhattan rentals.
The value of family’s portfolio in Manhattan alone is more than $200 million, according to real estate websites.
Stephenson is said to be from the Brazilian upper crust and is believed to be from a wealthy family. She once was known in Palm Beach society for dating wealthy men.
The Haruvi brothers had been struggling financially during the pandemic. New York real estate website The Real Deal reported that around 40% of their Manhattan apartments were vacant at one point.
And the brothers have been at each other’s throats with Arthur, 72, taking Abe to court accusing him of refusing to sign a refinance deal ‘for no other reason but to further a personal vendetta.’
Now the question remains whether the couple will divorce now that Stephenson will get nothing.
Her attorney Joel Weissman told the New York Post in January that regardless of the outcome of the criminal case, it would go ahead as the marriage is ‘not salvageable.’
Weissman did not return DailyMail.com’s request for comment following Haruvi’s acquittal.
Meanwhile Stephenson continues to live in the Palm Beach marital mansion while her husband stays elsewhere in Florida.
And she has filed a civil suit claiming the very fact he was arrested for battery should be cause for her to get the $60 million in a divorce.
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