Salim Mehajer’s $665K interior: Court tells him to settle the bill
US RAPPER Bow Wow danced in it and Salim Mehajer and his estranged wife Aysha posed for a magazine photo shoot in it. Now the colourful property manager has been told to pay for it.
NSW
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US RAPPER Bow Wow danced in it and colourful property developer Salim Mehajer and his estranged wife Aysha posed for a magazine photo shoot in it.
Now the former Auburn Deputy Mayor has been ordered by the NSW District Court to finally pay for the “marble palace” interior of his Lidcombe property in Sydney.
Mehajer was been ordered to pay Prime Marble and Granite $665,000 for the luxury Calcutta marble interior and other expensive stonework at his Lidcombe mansion which featured in a video clip by US rapper Bow Wow and a New Idea photo shoot.
District Court Judge Judith Gibson also took the unusual step to order Mr Mehajer to pay the plaintiff’s legal costs on an indemnity basis — which means he must pay Prime Marble and Granite’s entire bill, which is expected to exceed $100,000.
Mr Mehajer, who failed to even turn up for Thursday’s hearing, was slammed by Judge Gibson in her written judgment.
“The plaintiff constructed a marble palace in accordance with the defendant’s instructions, the exquisiteness of which is not in dispute.
“This is one of those rare cases where the court should make an order for indemnity costs of the proceedings, not to punish the defendant, but in response to the wholly unsatisfactory way in which the defendant has conducted the case at all relevant times,” Judge Gibson wrote.
The court heard Prime Marble and Granite was hired by Mr Mehajer in 2014 to undertake a year-long “massive project” installing marble and other stonework at the Lidcombe property.
The works included Calcutta marble floors in the kitchen, dining, living and entry area, sandstone cladding to two terrace walls, a marble wall in the property’s lift, travertine tile floors and granite paving stones.
Mr Mehajer had previously submitted that he had reached an agreement with Prime Marble and Granite director Alan Teo that he would pay for the stonework by issuing an equivalent credit note towards a unit at his proposed residential development in John St, Lidcombe.
Mr Teo, however, said the agreement was that Mr Mehajer would provide him with two units at a price reflecting at discount equal to the value of stone work completed at his Lidcombe mansion.
But the deal fell through when Mr Mehajer failed to get local government approval for his property development and Prime Marble and Granite were never paid.
The court heard Mr Mehajer had failed to instruct his lawyer Penny Musgrave about the case and had withdrawn all his funds from her trust account.
Ms Musgrave told the court when she tried to contact Mr Mehajer to tell him she was withdrawing from the case he sent her an email saying, “Please advise I am in Canberra following the death of my grandmother.”
Lawyer for Prime Marble and Granite, Khoder Dandachli of Thurlow Fisher said outside of court that, “justice has been served”.
“It is nice to see that he will be made to pay for something he should have paid for three years ago and my client is very happy about that,” he said.