Jeffrey Rackover usually makes news for his jewellery designs, favoured by celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey, Diana Ross and President Trump.
Today, however, the designer is making headlines for all the wrong reasons.
According to a new lawsuit, Jeffery allegedly attempted to help a young man he calls “his son” cover up a murder in the swanky Upper East Side apartment he was renting for him.
According to The New York Post, The 57-year-old diamond middleman provided paper towels and other cleaning supplies to cover up a murder by James Rackover, a man he reportedly shared a drug-fueled “intimate relationship” with while claiming to be his “parent.”
Confused? Us too.
Joseph ‘Joey’ Comunale was stabbed to death in November 2016, after a night of clubbing at the Gilded Lily in Chelsea.
Surveillance video footage shows Comunale, 26, and Lawrence Dilone, 28, escorting three girls out of James’ apartment shortly before 7am that morning.
They were then seen returning to the room.
During a fight which allegedly ensued over cigarettes, Dilone knocked out Comunale before James started strangling and stabbing him. James also attempted to dismember Comunale with a serrated knife, according to a confession Dilone allegedly made to the police.
The new lawsuit claims there is video evidence that supports this, as well as surveillance that shows Jeffrey, who lives on the 32nd floor, visiting James on the fourth floor, following the crime.
The police said the apartment was scattered with blood and “smelled from cleaning chemicals and the stench of death” from Comunale’s “decomposing body.”
On top of this, Jeffrey alledgedly allowed James to use his 2015 Black Mercedes-Benz to haul the corpse to Oceanport NJ, where authorities say that James and Dilone burnt Comunale’s body and buried the remains in a shallow ditch.
The suit, alleges that James and the jewellery designer were engaged in an intimate relationship. James legally changed his last name from Beaudion to Backover in March 2015 – after claiming to have learned Jeffery was his “real father.”
Speaking to The Post, Joseph Comunale’s grieving father, Pat, said he sued Jeffery Rackover to “get justice for my son” and “hold everybody involved accountable for this horrific crime.”
“These guys need to go away for a long time. All of them — and whoever else.”
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