Farber family: We don’t owe Fotis Dulos $1M
Attorneys representing Jennifer Dulos’ mother are requesting to file an additional brief rebutting Fotis Dulos’ claim — made after the civil trial ended — that she owes him $1 million.
William Murray, an attorney representing Fotis Dulos, filed the counterclaim last week along with closing arguments in the trial of the $2.5 million lawsuits Gloria Farber filed against her soninlaw.
Farber brought the lawsuits against Fotis Dulos more than a year before her daughter went missing as the couple was embroiled in a contentious divorce and custody battle for their five children. Farber contends in the lawsuits that her soninlaw owes her family $2.5 million in unpaid business loans made to his highend real estate company, Fore Group.
Fotis Dulos has been charged in his estranged wife’s May 24 disappearance and is also facing foreclosures on his properties in Farmington and New Canaan.
Farber is foreclosing on the Farmington home that Fotis Dulos built for his family in 2011. A $500,000 loan from the Farber family to Fotis and Jennifer Dulos for the home is also the subject of one of the lawsuits.
Attorney Richard Weinstein, representing Farber, wants the administrator of a trust appointed to deal with the family’s outstanding financial issues involving Fotis Dulos to be allowed to file a fivepage brief rebutting the $1 million counterclaim.
Weinstein also wants attorney Mark Dean, the administrator of the trust, to address Fotis Dulos’ claims that he’s protected from the lawsuit’s allegations by the state statute on fraud and the state statute of limitations.
Weinstein pointed out in a court filing made late Monday that Fotis Dulos did not bring up any of the legal issues, including the counterclaim, during a twoday trial of the lawsuits earlier this month.
Weinstein said he plans to file a motion to have the counterclaim stricken from the record. Hartford Superior Court Judge Cesar Noble is expected to make a decision on the lawsuits in the coming weeks.
Murray presented evidence during the trial, claiming Weinstein failed to deduct $1.8 million in money Fotis Dulos
“As we face this first holiday season without Jennifer, our sole focus is on creating a safe and joyous Christmas for her five children rather than to litigate this case through the media.” Family friend Carrie Luft, in a statement issued to Fox News
gave to his fatherinlaw, Hilliard Farber, and improperly listed about $750,000 in payments to the Fore Group for building a lavish guest house on Farber property in Pound Ridge, N.Y.
Murray claims that when those figures and others he provided in the trial are considered, the Farber family actually owes Fotis Dulos $1,042,300.
The legal wrangling between the attorneys intensified after Jennifer Dulos disappeared seven months ago. This week’s court filings are playing out against the backdrop of the missing persons case and the Dulos children’s first holiday season without their mother.
“As we face this first holiday season without Jennifer, our sole focus is on creating a safe and joyous Christmas for her five children rather than to litigate this case through the media,” family friend Carrie Luft said in a statement issued to Fox News.
In an interview with Fox News that aired Monday, Fotis Dulos reiterated his claim that the Farber family owes him $1 million and how he’s been kept in the dark about how his children are doing.
As part of the conditions of his release on bond for charges of tampering with evidence and hindering prosecution in his wife’s disappearance, Fotis Dulos is banned from contacting his children.
Farber has been caring for the children since Jennifer Dulos vanished and is seeking permanent custody of them.
Jennifer Dulos was last seen on a neighbor’s security camera returning to her New Canaan home after dropping off her children at a nearby school around 8:05 a.m. May 24.
According to arrest warrants, police believe Fotis Dulos was “lying in wait” when she returned home. Police said there were signs Jennifer Dulos was the victim of a “serious physical assault” based on blood stains and spatter found in her garage.
Police said two people resembling Fotis Dulos and his former girlfriend, Michelle Troconis, who is facing the same charges, were captured on video in Hartford around the time Jennifer Dulos was reported missing at 7 p.m. May 24.
The man police contend is Fotis Dulos was seen in the videos dumping bags that were later determined to contain his wife’s blood and clothing, the warrants said.
A separate arrest warrant said Fotis Dulos and Troconis took a red Toyota Tacoma pickup truck belonging to a Fore Group employee to a car wash in the days after the disappearance. Police said in the warrant that they believe Fotis Dulos drove the truck to New Canaan the morning of the disappearance.
Fotis Dulos also urged the employee to remove the seats, which police later found to contain Jennifer Dulos’ blood, according to the warrant.
Fotis Dulos will appear in Stamford Superior Court in the criminal cases on Jan. 9.