By Joe Anuta
The lawyer hired to file a $1.4 million suit against Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa and former state Assemblywoman Melinda Katz vowed to investigate whether the couple’s two children were really conceived via in-vitro fertilization while the beret-wearing crime fighter was still married.
“I’ve heard something about frozen sperm,” said attorney Paul Siegert. “We’ll find out about that.”
Siegert is representing Sliwa’s third wife Mary, who has accused the lovebirds of both having an extramarital affair and siphoning nearly half a million dollars from the Sliwa household to Katz through inflated child support payments, according to the suit filed in Manhattan civil court.
Katz is currently running for borough president on the Democratic ticket against six other contenders.
Her campaign dismissed the litigation and accused Mary Sliwa of being an opportunist.
“This is a sad, frivolous lawsuit. Unfortunately, it is an attempt to publicly rehash a long-ago settled divorce by using a political campaign for leverage,” said George Arzt, a spokesman for Katz. “Given the personal and family nature of the situation, we won’t be commenting further.”
The suit refers to Sliwa as an “inveterate, world-class liar” and goes into great detail about alleged instances where the Guardian Angel told his wife he would be sleeping at the Empire State Building, where he hosted a talk show, but actually met for illicit trysts with Katz.
Siegert did not elaborate about how the plaintiff knew of the exact times and dates of the alleged infidelities.
The suit also alleges that Sliwa and Katz conspired to conceive children via artificial insemination and then “drain marital assets” so Sliwa could leave his third wife for the borough president candidate. The crime fighter allegedly gave Katz $8,000 a month, several times the standard child support payment, the suit said. At one point, the money sent to Katz was taken from an account designed to help Sliwa’s special-needs child with Mary Sliwa, according to the suit.
Siegert said Tuesday that his team planned to investigate if the in-vitro claims were true.
In 2008, while Katz was running for city comptroller, she revealed that she was several months pregnant with a child conceived via in-vitro fertilization.
“I did this purely through modern technology. It was done in a doctor’s office. It was done at my wish and my desire,” she told the New York Post in April 2008, shortly before her 43rd birthday.
Katz told reporters she had struggled through health issues, including having an ovary removed in 1998, and had tried several fertility treatments.
She kept the identity of the donor a secret, even after she conceived a second son in 2011.
But in April 2012, four months before announcing her borough presidency campaign, Katz and Sliwa, 59, invited the Post into their Forest Hills home for a lengthy, sit-down interview to explain how they met and the backstory of how their children were born.
Reach reporter Joe Anuta by e-mail at januta@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
