The property cost about $250,000 a year to maintain in 2020, but maintenance was never an issue. They don’t like being criticized.”Īs the legal battles exploded, Alex was thrust into an unwanted spotlight, dubbed “America’s richest teenager.” At the heart of the lawsuits was the Mountain, which Mark had wanted preserved for his son. “Suzan wants Alex to have the life his father intended for him,” her lawyer, the late Hillel Chodos, said in a separate interview. “These three guys are employees, sycophants and dictators,” Suzan told a reporter in 2003. In court papers, Suzan said Alex’s lifestyle when his father was alive “included vacationing with Mark at his lavish beach home, sailing on Mark’s yacht, driving Mark’s fleet of luxury cars and attending events of extraordinary prestige, opulence and extravagance.” As Suzan saw it, Mark had hired the administrators to maintain Alex’s lifestyle, not downgrade it. Woods, said in a 2005 interview with Los Angeles Times: “Does he need a chandelier or would he settle for something from IKEA?” Any kid would be fine with Ikea, but Alex had been raised in mansions, with almost no budget in sight.
As the trustees’ attorney at the time, Edward A. The trustees consulted a psychiatrist and a rabbi about the potentially harmful impact of wealth on a child.
VF “I never got the impression that they were managing this property because they cared about Alex.” “The impression that everyone had on the trustees’ side was that Suzan herself applied to take over the trust because she was the mother of the only child and heir and therefore she had to be the trustee, even though it was Mark’s money and he was entitled to to choose who he wanted to manage it for Alex’s benefit – even though Mark didn’t have much insight into the people he named and they ended up abusing the trust,” said a lawyer who once worked for the trustees. “HE BECAME THE ONE THE DICTATOR OF MY LIFE.” “THE DEVIL WAS WEARING NOTHING CONRAD SMALL,” SUZAN SAYS ABOUT HER MILLIONAIRE EX’S TRUSTEE. She cast herself as a David against their Goliaths in a pre-#MeToo world, a world that dismissed her claims as a mother protecting her child, while administrators responded that she wanted to wrest control of the trust for her own benefit. The trustees denied her charges and Suzan lost. She also alleged that one of the administrators sexually harassed her and she wanted them removed. “Instead of acting like trustees, they wanted to be Mark Hughes and develop the mountain themselves,” Suzan said VF Suzan launched several lawsuits, claiming the group made “arbitrary and capricious” decisions and were hostile towards Alex. But, as Suzan charged in court, the trustees had plans of their own. A reportedly $400 million estate, including the mountain, went to his only son, Alex, then eight years old.Īnd a brutal war ensued, pitting Alex and his mother, Suzan Hughes, against the estate’s three trustees, whose role was to protect the estate’s assets until Alex turned 35. Three years after Hughes bought the land, he had died of an overdose of alcohol and antidepressants. Hughes planned to build his own dream house there, but his entire dream unraveled. In 1997, Griffin sold to Herbalife guru Mark Hughes for $8.5 million, setting a Southern California record at the time.
Next came Merv Griffin, who bested Aaron Spelling by building the city’s largest mansion at his peak then he ran out of steam. She planned to build her brother a palace in exile until Molotov cocktail-throwing Iranian students changed her mind. The last Shah of Iran’s sister once owned the Mountain. Elsewhere known as Tower Grove or the Vineyard, the Mountain of Beverly Hills is arguably the city’s most spectacular piece of undeveloped land.įor the rare few who have owned it, the Mountain has been both a blessing and a curse. Yet the only creatures that make the mountain their home are the deer that frolic nearby. Rihanna, Salma Hayek, James Cameron, Elon Musk and others have made pilgrimages to the mountain for traveling Oscar parties and charity balls. Spanning an area larger than 100 football pitches, this grassy, lush mountaintop has been the prize – once valued at $1 billion – of Middle Eastern royalty, A-list stars and mega-moguls. Many have coveted its 157 acres, but the mountain has remained tantalizingly out of reach. High above the lights of Los Angeles stands the mountain, impenetrable to the Hollywood power players and business tycoons who plot and scheme below.
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