Katy Perry’s ongoing legal battle just got a curious new twist.
The “Dark Horse” singer has been marred with legal troubles for over two years over a home she and then-fiancé Orlando Bloom purchased in Santa Barbara, California (home to Prince Harry, Meghan Markle, Oprah Winfrey, Ellen DeGeneres and others) five years ago.
The former couple, along with her business manager Bernie Gudvi, are being accused of having disingenuously bought the property, with its previous owner claiming he was not of sound mind when he agreed to sell it, and now, an unlikely A-Lister has entered the fold.
Us Weekly reported this week that per court documents, Katy is now set to be questioned about reports that she rented out the home to none other than Chris Pratt and his wife Katherine Schwarzenegger.
The couple — who have also faced controversy over their own home purchases — allegedly recently moved into the eight-bedroom, nine-bathroom, 9,285 square-foot estate.
The residence was purchased by Katy for $15 million, via her business manager, from Carl Westcott in 2020, the founder of 1-800 Flowers, who purchased the home for $11.25 million just two months before he sold it.
Westcott, 86, who was diagnosed with Huntington’s Disease — a rare, degenerative brain disease — in 2015, claimed days after the deal was finalized that he had changed his mind about the sale.
After a suicide attempt in October of 2021, the business entrepreneur was transferred to a mental health facility in Dallas, and reportedly currently lives in a facility for patients facing dementia.
In his lawsuit against Bernie, he alleges Katy’s manager refused to back out of the deal despite his plea, while Bernie argued the deal was valid and asked for it to be enforced.
People reported in 2023 that per Wescott’s lawyer, in the midst of the sale, he was showing signs of both “delusion” and “intrusive thoughts,” plus “post-operative delirium” as a result of spinal surgery just five days before the sale.
A week after the surgery, when he claims he started to feel “mentally clear,” Westcott reached out to Katy’s business manager Bernie, retracting his wishes of selling the home.
Westcott’s daughter-in-law is Cameron Westcott, star of Real Housewives of Dallas (which was canceled in 2021), who has taken to social media in the past to support her father-in-law and criticize Katy and Orlando’s actions. “He doesn’t deserve to be in this position, especially when he’s on his deathbed. It is absolutely heartless that he has to go through all this,” she wrote on her Instagram as the trial began back in 2023.
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