Orange County Superior Court Judge Kimberly Knill on Wednesday ordered Gross, 76, and his partner Amy Schwartz to stop playing sitcom theme songs and other loud music when they aren’t outdoors for three years and directed them to stay at least five metres away from their next-door neighbours in Laguna Beach.
The neighbours both have modernist, multimillion-dollar trophy homes overlooking the Pacific.
Tech entrepreneur Mark Towfiq sought the restraining order to stop what he alleged was “a targeted campaign of harassment” and retaliation that began after he complained to city officials that the billionaire co-founder of Pacific Investment Management had installed unsightly netting over a million-dollar sculpture in his yard without proper permits.
“The court finds the evidence demonstrates Gross and Schwartz wilfully playing music to annoy or harass their neighbours,” Knill said. “The evidence demonstrates on August 23, 2020, Gross and Schwartz manually started the playlist over and over again,” the judge said, pointing out that one 17-minute video from a camera in Towfiq’s property showed that Gilligan’s Island played eight times, as did Green Acres.
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Knill issued her ruling on the neighbours’ duelling harassment complaints after holding one of the rare in-person trials in California during the coronavirus pandemic which featured testimony over nine days, including from both men, their partners, a Nasa scientist with expertise on sound and Laguna Beach officials.
While the two men still have separate lawsuits pending against each for monetary damages, the judge said she’d consider Towfiq’s request that Gross pay his legal fees in this case.
The judge threw out Gross’s request that Towfiq be ordered to stop taking videos and pictures of the billionaire and Schwartz, saying Gross failed to prove he was harassed.
Despite the rulings, the two sides remain at odds.
Gross’s lawyer Jill Basinger said the judge’s decision was “disappointing”, and called Towfiq’s case a “personal vendetta” over the billionaire’s “art and music choices”.
“This order is not some sort of censure of either Bill Gross or Amy Schwartz,” she said in a statement. “This order merely directs them to continue doing what they already do: follow the law.” She also repeated Gross’s claims that his neighbour had “weaponised” police complaints to “bully” Schwartz and Gross.
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Chase Scolnick, Towfiq’s lawyer, called the decision “a huge loss” for Gross and a “long overdue victory” for his clients. He said they had been living a “nightmare” and Towfiq looks forward to a jury hearing his complaints at the civil trial.
Additional reporting by Tribune News Service
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