Phil Collins and ex-wife told to settle dispute over Miami mansion via Zoom call or face years of delay in court
A judge has urged Phil Collins and his former wife to settle out their differences over a zoom call instead of going to trial. Collins' former wife Orianne Cevey Collins and her new husband are unlawfully occupying the singer's $40 Miami mansion. The 69-year-old Collins believes that Orianne has no right whatsoever to live in his palatial mansion with her new husband, 31-year-old Thomas Bates, and wants to have her kicked out, according to a Daily Mail report.
A court was told how Collins had agreed to mediation with his 46-year-old ex who claims that it is her home under a "verbal cohabitation agreement" and wants around $20 million to leave. Collins, who is currently in London rehearsing for an upcoming Genesis reunion will come face to face with his ex and her new husband via a zoom call, when the talks begin on Friday, October 30.
The lawyers of the former couple are due in Miami Dade Circuit Court on Monday, November 2, to contest an injunction filed by Collins which demands that Orianne and her husband immediately vacate the mansion. However, judge Spencer Eig has urged the ex-couple to sort out their differences behind closed doors.
Eig told a preliminary hearing, "The court will issue an order then compelling mediation by close of business Friday. Everyone can participate on Zoom." Orianne's attorney Richard Wolfe has agreed that the trio would be "well served by an early mediation."
Wolfe shared that Orianne and Bates had already agreed that Collins could retrieve some of his most prized possessions which include unpublished music, a platinum disc and a collection of historic artefacts from the Battle of the Alamo. Wolfe said, "Whatever they claim in their motion, they can have it. They can have all the memorabilia, all the so-called Alamo collection. They are his, we don't want it."
"Our position is we have just as much right to own this house and possess this house by virtue of an oral agreement," Wolfe revealed. Collins' attorney Jeff Fisher had agreed to the talks but cautioned that he had struggled to negotiate successfully with Orianne's previous lawyers.
"I won't profess to be optimistic but lighting can strike and of course we will go to a mediation," Fisher said. Judge Eig had also asked the two sides to 'touch base' with him on Friday afternoon to keep him updated on how the mediation was going. He also urged them to 'save taxpayers money' by not printing out big hefty binders of legal arguments.
We had previously reported that the drummer is said to be fighting to take back control of his $33-million beachfront Miami mansion from Cevey. In July, Cevey had broken up with Collins via a text message in which she also told him about her new husband.
Cevey reportedly went to Las Vegas and married the new person in her life on August 2. The couple then made their way to Miami and started staying in Collins' mansion. The duo reportedly have also hired four armed guards to patrol the property and have changed all the security codes.
According to legal documents, the couple is allegedly "threatening, implicitly and explicitly, to prolong their unlawful occupation of the property through force" even though the property is owned solely by Collins.