The legal fight between pop star Katy Perry and veteran Carl Westcott just got much more complicated. Actor Chris Pratt has now been pulled into the ongoing drama. This whole situation started from a property sale back in 2020. Westcott sold his Santa Barbara home to Perry for $15 million. Perry bought the property through her business manager, Bernie Gudvi.
Just days after signing the contract, Westcott tried to cancel the deal. He said he wasn’t thinking clearly when he agreed to sell the property. Westcott has Huntington’s disease, which is a brain condition passed down through families that slowly gets worse over time.
It’s a terrible illness that affects movement, memory, and thinking. Sadly, there’s no cure for it. Someone like Perry could have easily let go of the incident. But according to Unilad, Perry launched a legal retaliation campaign that seems totally unnecessary.
Perry’s million-dollar demands seem harsh for a sick veteran
Even though Westcott said he wasn’t in the right state of mind, a lawsuit happened and a judge first ruled in Perry’s favor. The judge said there was proof showing Westcott was “clear-headed, involved, aware, and thinking straight” when he signed the contract. This isn’t the first time Perry has been involved in controversial property disputes, and some people still remember her past legal battles with homeowners.
Perry then sued Westcott back, asking for millions of dollars. She says Westcott owes her $3.25 million in losses because she couldn’t rent out the property between September 2020 and March 2024. On top of that, Perry’s team added another $2.29 million to the bill, saying the property needs to be fixed up to match how it was when she bought it.
The trial was split into two parts, and the second part, which looks at those huge damage claims, started again on Thursday, August 21. This is why Chris Pratt is now part of this case.
It turns out that Pratt is currently renting the property from Perry. Westcott’s lawyers are now asking the judge to question Pratt about the supposed damages to the house. AWestcott’s team pointed out that this is “new, never-before shown proof.” They noted that Perry has rented the home to Pratt and his wife, who is Maria Shriver’s daughter.
This matters because Shriver was reportedly competing with Perry to buy the property back in 2020. That’s why Perry raised her first offer of $13.5 million to the final $15 million price. Westcott’s legal team is saying that the demand for $2.29 million in repairs is “fake” if Perry was able to rent the house “as-is” to Pratt.
However, Melcher added that repairs could easily have been done by Perry before Pratt moved in. If that happened, he notes, the condition of the home when Pratt became a renter isn’t really important to what the home looked like when Perry first got the keys. Perry has faced criticism for other issues recently too, including questions about her tour choreography choices.
