That won’t be all sir, warns butler
WAITING outside a strip club to pick up his boss at 4am, rushing home to fix the DStv, chauffeuring a child to school and fixing leaks.
These were some of the duties Flavio Porceddu fulfilled as Brian Myerson’s butler for 12 years. Now Porceddu spends sleepless nights thinking of ways to get what the business tycoon owes him after he was summarily fired last year.
Myerson made headlines in 2008 when his extraordinary double life was exposed. His wife, Ingrid, sued for divorce after discovering he had kept a mistress around the corner from their R120-million London home for a decade, and fathered a son with her. The court ordered Myerson, 57, to pay her R188-million.
He handed over all but R7million. Last year the High Court in Cape Town discounted his pleas of poverty and ordered him to come up with the cash. Ingrid’s lawyer, Rael Gootkin, told the Sunday Times this week the matter had been settled.
But now Myerson faces a new court battle after he ignored a Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration agreement to pay Porceddu R175 000 in three instalments by January 30 this year. Myerson paid only the first instalment, of R35 000.
Porceddu’s lawyer, Michelle Thatcher, told the Sunday Times this week that she obtained a warrant of execution against Myerson, and the sheriff attached three Apple computers, four Samsung flat-screen TV sets, a Cerrato R53T bicycle, a Honda bicycle and a Ford F100 truck at Myerson’s home in Fresnaye, Cape Town.
But Myerson’s lawyer, Ian Stoloff, told her and the sheriff that the items were not owned by Myerson, but by a trust in Geneva.
The Fresnaye home — which is on the market for R185-million — is owned by a company called Golden Mask Properties 23, whose sole director is Stoloff, 80, of Plettenberg Bay.
Porceddu insists he purchased the movable items on behalf of Myerson.
“I bought all three computers, they are R28 000 each,” said Porceddu. “I bought all the four TVs in the house. I bought about 10 TVs total. But the four TVs were the big ones and the most LEAK: Former butler Flavio Porceddu outside Myerson’s home in Cape Town
I was on call 24/7, driving him around, picking him up
recent ones. One was R50 000.”
Porceddu said Myerson fired him because he took too long to get to his house and stop a leak in the kitchen after a storm last September.
The 43-year-old said he had been dedicated to his job and had gone beyond the call of duty. He said he could not have a stable relationship or start a family because he was constantly at Myerson’s side.
In an interview with the Sunday Times, Porceddu said: “I was on call 24/7, driving him around, picking him up. I would take him out at night, take him to Mavericks. I took him there and had to pick him up at 4am.
“I did the maintenance of his house, driving and anything you can think of.
“If anything went wrong at night, he would call me — lights are out, generator is not working, DStv is not working — I had to go there and fix it.”
Responding to questions, Stoloff said Myerson “has never complained of fair and reasonable newspaper criticism, but to such gutter journalism as that which your e-mail message foreshadows he cannot and will not submit”.
He added: “Much of the content of Mr Porceddu’s claims are untrue but since it is not the Myerson family’s policy to comment on family matters or newspaper attacks, Mr Myerson is not prepared to do so, particularly inasmuch as ‘the story’ is defamatory of him.”