Phil Collins’ ex-wife Orianne Cevey has claimed that the singer is going back on his promise to give her half ownership of his $40million Miami mansion and says living with him was unbearable after he became a hermit and refused to shower for nearly a year.
Last week, DailyMail.com exclusively revealed that Cevey, 46, and Collins, 69, have reached a ‘partial settlement’ in the bitter battle to remove her and her new husband from the singer’s Florida home.
Collins insists Cevey has no right to live in his palatial waterfront property with her new husband Thomas Bates, 31, and sued to have her kicked out.
But Cevey has filed new documents in the ongoing battle over the property. According to TMZ, Cevey has claimed Collins is backing out of a 2015 deal the former couple made when they rekindled their relationship.
Cevey said she surrendered a $20m stake in her previous Miami home by getting a ‘quickie divorce’ from her previous husband, Charles Mejjati.
She picked out and jointly furnished the waterfront mansion, paid her share of the bills for five years and had an ‘oral co-habitation agreement’ with Collins who promised her a 50 per cent stake in their new home, according to a previous filing.
Phil Collins’ ex-wife Orianne Cevey (right with her new husband) has claimed that the singer is going back on his promise to give her 50% ownership of his $40M Miami mansion and says living with him was unbearable after he became a hermit and refused to shower for a year
Cevey has claimed Collins is backing out of a 2015 oral deal the former couple made when they rekindled their relationship. She said Collins promised her a 50% stake in their new home (pictured) if she divorced her then husband, Charles Mejjati
But things took a turn for the worst shortly after the Swiss jewelry designer agreed to the terms and moved back in with Collins and their children. She claims in the new documents that Collins became a hermit and shut out everyone.
Eventually, she says he lost his musical talents and started abusing pain killers, according to TMZ. To make matters worse, Cevey said Collins refused to shower for nearly a year from 2019-2020.
Collins began to smell and his ‘stench became so pervasive that he became a hermit, refusing to interact personally with any people’, Cevey claims.
Last week, Collins, Bates and Cevey came face to face for the first time for mediation talks held via Zoom.
At that time, Cevey and Bates agreed to vacate the mansion by ‘mid-January’ so Collins can put in on the market and sell it, according to the star’s lawyer, Jeff Fisher.
He revealed that the legal wrangle over Cevey’s counterclaim for $20million – around half the value of the house – had not been settled however, and will head towards a trial.
‘Mr and Mrs Bates’ plan to hold Phil Collins’ house as hostage to leverage a settlement during a protracted court case that was upended by the new judge’s bold decision to complete the injunction hearing next week,’ Fisher said in a statement.
‘With the delay tactic failing, they agreed to vacate by mid-January and to allow Phil’s realtor to market and sell the property between now and the date they leave. Further, Phil Collins’ priceless collection of music memorabilia and artifacts from the Alamo will be retrieved within days.
‘Mrs Bates’ lawsuit claiming a 50 per cent interest in the house based upon an alleged oral agreement will continue, but we have no doubt that it too will come to a quick and conclusive end once the judge hears the true facts about what occurred.’
A court case scheduled for Monday and Tuesday at Miami Dade Circuit Court was also been canceled though our source did not rule out future legal moves should the agreement collapse.
The pair (left in 2018 and right in 2019) married in 1999 and had two sons, Nicholas, 19, and Matthew, 15, before splitting seven years later – they officially rekindled their relationship in 2016
Despite splitting from Collins and remarrying, Cevey claimed the mansion is just as much her home as his under a ‘verbal cohabitation agreement’ and wanted $20million to leave.
Collins, currently in London rehearsing for an upcoming Genesis reunion, sought an injunction that would have allowed him to send in cops to physically remove the couple.
However, he softened his stance earlier this week and agreed instead to go into formal mediation.
Collins launched his drastic legal action earlier this month after calling it quits with Cevey for the second time.
The pair married in 1999 and had two sons, Nicholas, 19, and Matthew, 15, before splitting seven years later.
Despite agreeing to a record $47m divorce settlement they surprised the world in 2016 when they announced they were back together and living in the Miami home, which Collins purchased through an LLC.
However the relationship ended, seemingly for good, when he discovered Cevey had ‘secretly’ married Bates in Las Vegas on August 2.
According to court filings, the Against All Odds crooner left in a hurry for Switzerland and gave the couple until October 12 to pack their bags and move so he could put the plush property up for sale.
When they failed to leave, Collins sued Cevey for unlawful detainer and forcible entry, accusing the pair of hiring armed guards, covering over security cameras and changing alarm codes to seize the house ‘by a show of force’.
The newlyweds hit back with their own filing, dismissing the allegations as ‘nothing more than a retaliation’ to the new marriage and a ‘shameful story’ that Collins had ‘fabricated’.
Cevey claims to have informed Collins about her marriage to Bates after making multiple attempts to talk about their ‘deteriorating relationship’ which she maintains he was unwilling to address.
The mother-of-three admits covering over security cameras but alleges that this was because Collins had 20 secret devices installed around the $12,000 sq ft residence to spy on her, including in her bathroom and changing room.
‘These cameras were installed without my knowledge or consent. I covered these cameras with Band-Aids in order to preserve my privacy and the privacy of my children in the Family Home,’ Cevey said in her filing.
‘I was greatly disturbed and outraged that Mr Collins apparently requested that hidden cameras be installed in these rooms.’
Cevey insists that having to leave the house would be especially unfair on her youngest son – a nine-year-old referred to in court documents only as A.A. – with whom she shares custody with Miami-based Mejjati.
Because her counterclaim for an ‘equitable interest’ in the home would likely exceed the maximum of $30,000 that can be awarded in the county courts, a judge decided last week to move it- to circuit court.
The development put Collins’ filling at the back of a long line of pending cases with court closures and pandemic restrictions expected to delay jury trials by a year or longer.
That left the British rock star – worth an estimated $300m – having to choose between paying his ex-wife off for the second time or facing off with her in a bitter, drawn-out court battle.