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Business News Legal
Rihanna’s former accountant hits back, says singer’s financial woes all her fault
By Chris Cooke | Published on Monday 24 March 2014
The ongoing legal squabble between Rihanna and her former bean counters continues, with accountant Peter Gounis filing a response to the singer’s most recent lawsuit on the matter.
As previously reported, in 2012 Rihanna sued accountancy firm Berdon LLP and it’s former employees Gounis and Michael Mitnick – who did accountancy stuff for the singer between 2005 and 2010 – claiming that they had mismanaged her financial affairs losing her millions. The accountants responded by saying that any losses during this period were solely due to Rihanna’s “own financial action or inaction”.
But that didn’t stop the pop lady filing new legal proceedings last month, specifically claiming that bad advice from her former accountants in 2009 left her “effectively bankrupt”, and saddled with a property that she then had to sell for $2 million less than she paid to acquire it in the first place. It’s that latest litigation that, according to TMZ, Gounis has now responded to.
And the accounts man is pretty blunt in his call to have the case against him dismissed. He reportedly says that he was specifically hired to record and manage Rihanna’s financial accounts, and not to give the singer day-to-day spending advice. And besides, he adds, “was it really necessary to tell her that if you spend money for things you will end up with the things, and not the money?”
Gounis says that Rihanna’s fortune dropped dramatically towards the end of the last decade simply because she blew millions on pointless shopping sprees and extravagant parties. She also bailed on an important tour, he says, to take a role in the flop movie ‘Battleship’. And as for the bad property investment, he never directed the singer to make such a purchase, he says.
The squabble continues.
