UES 'Worst Landlord' Sued By Her Son Over Dire Building Conditions

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — A man's attempt to cut his mother and sister out of their family's real estate fortune has escalated into a messy court battle, touching on the poor conditions inside the family's three Upper East Side buildings.

William Koeppel filed suit in Manhattan surrogate's court earlier this year against his mother, Roberta, and sister, Alexandra. Roberta inherited a trust of 13 rental buildings in New York City and Long Island that had been left to her when her husband, Robert Koeppel — William's father — died in 1996.

Since his father's death, William has had "no meaningful contact" with his sister or mother, whom he accuses of abusing him during his childhood, the lawsuit says.

Now, William is taking aim at his mother, noting that she appeared on the 2020 "Worst Landlord Watchlist" released by the city's Public Advocate — ranking 47th in the top 50 based on the number of open violations in her buildings.

Koeppel's spot on that list owed largely to the conditions in her Brooklyn buildings, several of which have dozens of violations on record with the city's housing department. But Roberta's three Upper East Side properties have also racked up a combined 23 open violations, city records show.

Worst among them is 1594 Third Ave., a five-story rental between East 89th and 90th streets, where tenants' complaints of rats, faulty fire escapes and broken carbon monoxide detectors have amounted to 18 open violations.

On the same block, Koeppel's building at 141 East 89th St. has reports of a broken window and chipped paint, while a final building at 250 East 73rd St. has one open violation, for mice in a fourth-floor apartment.

Leaving the buildings in disrepair could diminish their property values or even prompt tenants to stage a rent strike, according to William Koeppel, who argues that his mother is breaching her fiduciary duty. William is slated to inherit 11 of the 13 buildings if he survives his mother, while the remaining two would go to Alexandra and another sister.

In her own deposition made in 2019, Roberta said she had "no recollection" of the violations in her buildings, but added that it would take a "genius and expeditor" to get violations removed, according to William's suit.

Meanwhile, William's attorneys also filed an affidavit from his mother's 98-year-old cousin, Harriet Charles, attesting that Roberta has harbored a lifelong grudge against her son.

"For instance, when he was only an infant, rather than try to settle him down at night, she would place a mattress over the top of his crib so he would not make as much noise and essentially cry himself to sleep," Charles attests. As William got older, Roberta would lock her son in a closet and eventually a dog crate "when she did not want to deal with him," according to Charles.

Roberta and Alexndra have not yet filed a formal response to William's complaints, and their attorney Edward Campbell declined to comment on Thursday. The court battle was first reported by Crain's.