In the civil justice system, business fraud crimes are considered particularly heinous. But the actors playing dedicated NYPD detectives can't possibly know that one of their luxury condos is ending up in the hands of a Georgia fraudster. This is his story.
Law & Order: SVU star Chris Meloni's old New York City apartment is now at the center of some serious legal drama. It has become the hideout of a fracking industry fraudster who deceived a business partner in Texas, lost a court case there and dodged a $1 million judgment for so long that he now owes three times that amount.
According to the Observer, David Sepiachvili and Natalia Sapir Antonni bought the actor's midtown Manhattan condo eight years ago for $8.15 million. But on Friday, a scorned Russian investor named Nikolay Rastorguev sued the couple in New York state court, saying Sepiachvili was now playing shell games to avoid losing the massive four-bedroom apartment in a prime estate just a block from Carnegie Hall. to avoid.
The lawsuit states that Sepiachvili recently transferred ownership of the condo to Antonni to avoid paying the payment, which has since ballooned to $3 million with interest.
Sepiachvili, who is from Russia's neighboring country Georgia, ran into serious financial difficulties shortly after purchasing the actor's condominium. According to federal court documents obtained by The Daily Beast, he accepted $800,000 from Rastorguev in July 2016 in exchange for shares in an oil and gas company called Austin Chalk Development Project. But a court found that instead of holding up his end of the deal and acquiring the land he had promised to buy, the money was diverted in other directions – and Rastorguev never got it back.
Harper Estes, a Texas attorney who serves as a private judge when people resolve legal issues in arbitration, reviewed the case for a federal court and determined in 2021 that it was a “garden variety fraud.” But he also called it a “rare case that supports the claim of a civil conspiracy.”
“Knowledge of the oil and gas industry or the use of real estate brokerage firms cannot and does not in any way justify taking other people's funds under false pretenses and using them for other purposes,” he wrote.
The arbitrator noted something else: The scheme involved a company called Level One Advisors and another man with a similar name, David A. Sepiashvili. This confusing twist points to a New York Republican politician who serves as the elected GOP district manager in Brooklyn and previously worked for the city's election board. This second Sepiashvili – this time spelled with an “s” – lists himself on LinkedIn as founder and president of Level One, points to the company's stake in Austin Chalk and calls it an “unconventional oil and gas development project.” Calls, text messages and social media messages to the second man with a similar name went unanswered Monday.
However, the money appears to have never been paid out. When a year passed, the Russian sued both men in Brooklyn in 2022 – and quickly won a verdict in state court.
The Russian is resorting to this third attempt by suing in Manhattan state court and trying to get a judge to intervene by blocking the first Sepiachvili from changing the ownership status of the condo – and ordering its immediate sale in order to protect the property to pay off outstanding debts.
When reached Monday, Sepiachvili declined to elaborate on his longstanding legal troubles, only describing his despised business partner Rastorguev as a man with ties to some “bad people in Russia.”
“He’s an asshole,” Sepiachvili said.