Cher is suing a financial management partnership she claims defrauded her of $800,000 in investments that went wrong, according to the Associated Press.
The suit was filed on Wednesday in Los Angeles County Superior Court on behalf of Veritas Trust, of which the singer is the sole trustee.
It targets Sail Venture Partners and related firms and accuses them of bundling Cher’s money into “risky and unsound” investments. The lawsuit alleges Sail’s principals engaged in “malicious and fraudulent” behaviour.
Messages seeking comment from Sail officials weren’t immediately returned on Wednesday. The suit seeks financial restitution and punitive damages but didn’t specify amounts.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, Cher claims that over 2006 and 2007 Veritas’s business manager, Warren Grant, persuaded her to make investments of about $1.3m as a limited partner in Sail Venture Partners and Sail Sage Water Partners.
The complaint says: “Defendants routinely leveraged their insider positions with the portfolio companies to placate limited partners with news of supposed ‘exit strategies,’ impending ‘initial public offerings,’ and the potential for ‘enormous’ profits. Unbeknown to Veritas, Defendants secured its capital and that of several other limited partners under duress at the 11th hour ... these bizarre and improper management tactics were a harbinger of worse to come.”
Of the 10 companies in the initial portfolio, three are bankrupt and most of the others will produce no return, the complaint says, even though “defendants continued to collect management fees and lull the limited partners with false, rosy representations in violation of the Partnership Agreements”.
Cher, whose performing career stretches back to the mid-1960s, last toured as a singer in 2014.
