She said she was raped by one of the most powerful men on Wall Street. Now he says she professed her love during a years-long affair—and that he was later extorted for millions.
The private-equity billionaire Leon Black on Monday offered a formal rebuttal—at times in astonishing detail—to allegations leveled by a former model from Russia named Guzel Ganieva. Black vigorously denied Ganieva’s allegation that he assaulted her, instead admitting to an affair in a New York state court filing, and saying he used “extremely poor judgment.”
Both sides acknowledge this much: For years the married Black, then head of Apollo Global Management Inc., had a sexual relationship with Ganieva, who’s about 30 years younger than the father of four. There the accounts diverge—and open a rare window into the private life one of the most formidable figures in American finance.
Black, 69, is fighting to defend his reputation after falling from the apex of Wall Street. In March, he left Apollo after more than a year of scandal around his controversial ties to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, whom he paid $158 million for financial advice.
In Monday’s 52-page filing, Black revealed text messages, conversations based on recordings he says he made, and other intimate aspects of his life unlike anything Wall Street has seen since the #MeToo movement started four years ago, sending shock waves through Hollywood, Washington and beyond.
A representative for Ganieva didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Black met Ganieva in New York in 2008, at a party of a former colleague, the start of what he characterized in the filing as a consensual affair. (Ganieva claims in her lawsuit that she told Black when they met their relationship would not be sexual).
Black said he tried to help her get jobs, and that he paid for her apartment, vacations and school tuition at Columbia University. By Black’s account, he showered Ganieva with gifts she requested, including a Steinway piano, a $40,000 commissioned portrait of herself and “many, many gifts of cash.”
In Ganieva’s version, he set up “sham interviews,” including with Goldman Sachs Group Inc., that weren’t meant to be legitimate and only gave her loans to put her “in his debt forever.”
In 2015, Black alleges in the filing that Ganieva “threatened to go public about their relationship” and said she would hurt his personal and professional life unless he paid her $100 million.
That prompted the billionaire to start recording conversations with Ganieva and led to a so-called confidentiality and release agreement, which she signed at the Four Seasons restaurant a few months later, according to his filing.
In exchange for her releasing any claims against Black and promising not to discuss their relationship, Black said he forgave loans he’d made to her totaling about $1 million, made a $100,000 payment to Ganieva, agreed to provide monthly payments and gave her 2 million pounds ($2.74 million) so she could obtain a British passport.