Perelman family conflict grows as son sues father, brother

It is a family feud of epic proportions that involves one of the city's most prominent families and has spilled into state and federal court.

And last week, the legal discord that has been raging between Jeffrey E. Perelman, and his father, Ray, and older brother, Ron, got even more rancorous.

According to a lawsuit filed in federal district court, Jeffrey claims that Ray improperly steered millions of dollars from a pension plan the two were involved with into the global cosmetics company that Ron controls.

Ray, 93, is a Philadelphia businessman and philanthropist who sits on the board of trustees of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the University of Pennsylvania Medical School. Ron, 67, is a billionaire investor, and chairman and controlling shareholder of Revlon. Jeffrey, 61, is chairman and chief executive of Wynnewood-based JEP Management Inc., a privately held company that owns gardening, landscaping and turf-care-equipment businesses, among others.

The Perelman name graces several institutions around town, including an art museum annex on the Ben Franklin Parkway, a theater inside the Kimmel Center and the quadrangle at Penn.

The lawsuit that pits Jeffrey against Ray and Ron is the latest chapter in a legal tussle that began last year. But the trouble really had its genesis more than 20 years ago, when Jeffrey, fed up with his role in the family business, moved to Colorado.

Hoping to lure his son back to Philadelphia, Ray struck a deal with Jeffrey in 1990 that included a trust set up to benefit Jeffrey's daughter. But a suit filed Oct. 19, 2009, in Common Pleas Court claims that Jeffrey "fraudulently" altered the terms of the trust so he and his wife could control the income it generated.

Ray maintained the income was to be set aside for Jeffrey's daughter.

The state suit was dismissed in March, but Ray appealed the decision to Superior Court. That appeal is pending.

That same day in October 2009, Jeffrey filed his own lawsuit in federal court claiming that his father was "bent on destroying [Jeffrey's] reputation in the business and philanthropic communities" and that Ron was trying "to fan the flames."

A few weeks later, Jeffrey amended the lawsuit to include claims of defamation against Ray and Ron who, he alleges, told family and friends that Jeffrey had "defrauded" Ray in their business dealings. Jeffrey also claimed his father told family and friends that Jeffrey "stole" from his daughter.

The federal lawsuit is on hold pending the outcome of the appeal in Superior Court.

Now, Jeffrey has fired another legal shot across the bow of his father and brother.

The new suit charges the elder Perelman, as a trustee and administrator of the General Refractories Co. Pension Plan for Salaried Employees, had engaged in prohibited "party-in-interest" transactions and then concealed them from plan participants. (Federal pension law prohibits plan fiduciaries from engaging in a transaction that the fiduciary knows is a conflict of interest.)

Jeffrey has been a plan participant since 1985, and Ray served as a trustee and administrator of the plan in 2003, 2004 and 2005, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit said Ray was also a trustee of the plan in 2006, 2007 and 2008, but the administrator in those years was Jason Guzek, also named as a defendant in the lawsuit.

Jeffrey alleges that Revlon was facing a cash crunch in early 2004 and needed a "cash infusion."

The lawsuit said Ron enlisted two lieutenants to reach out to his father to purchase Revlon bonds, which would then be converted into Revlon stock.

Records filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in April 2004 reflected that Ray Perelman was a beneficial owner of 32.6 million shares of Revlon's Class A common stock, the lawsuit said, but plan records filed with the Department of Labor in 2004, 2005 and 2006 did not disclose that relationship.

The lawsuit said the pension plan had a market value of $11.2 million at the end of plan year 2003, $13.8 million in 2004 and $13.6 million in 2005.

The lawsuit said more than $29 million in plan assets was invested in Revlon bonds in plan years 2003 through 2005, representing more than a third of all plan assets for 2004 and 2005.

And Ray did so not for the benefit of plan participants, the lawsuit said, but for his and Ron's personal benefit. The lawsuit didn't specify what benefit, if any, Ray or Ron allegedly received.

Plan-audit reports did not identify any investments in Revlon or party-in-interest transactions until October 2007, the lawsuit said.

Jeffrey wants a judge to order Ray to restore any losses suffered by the plan or profits realized by him, Ron or Revlon as a result of their alleged party-in-interest transactions and failure to diversify plan assets.

None of the defendants in the lawsuit has filed answers yet.

Larry McMichael, Ray's attorney, declined to comment on specific allegations in Jeffrey's lawsuit but said it would be "vigorously defended."

Attorneys for Jeffrey, Ron and Guzek didn't return calls for comment.

Even though Ray ceased to be plan administrator at the end of plan year 2005, the plan invested almost $8.3 million in Revlon bonds in plan years 2006 through 2008, the lawsuit said.