The advertisements were iconic: Leona Helmsley, the imperious second-wife of a billionaire hotelier, and notorious 'Queen of Mean,' stood dripping in diamonds at the foot of the palatial Helmsley Palace Hotel staircase. With her arms spread in grandeur, the tagline read: 'The only palace in the world where the queen stands guard.'
One decade later, Leona's lawyer, Sandor Frankel recalled her striking that same triumphant pose from her advertisements, except this time she was wearing an oversized gray sweat suit and in federal prison for tax fraud.
By then, Leona Helmsley had become one of the most reviled people in the country, with a reputation for 'tyrannizing employees' and excoriating them over slight infractions. But in her darkest moment, Frankel remembers seeing his larger-than-life client as a 'frightened 71-year-old inmate' in desperate need of someone she could trust.
In his forthcoming memoir, The Accidental Philanthropist, Sandor Frankel tells the story of how he went from a 'country lawyer from the Bronx' to Leona Helmsley's personal consigliere.
Detailing their 18-year-long relationship, Frankel describes being fired and rehired during multiple fits of rage; and ultimately being appointed the executor of her $5billion estate when she died in 2007.
Leona Helmsley, the notorious 'Queen of Mean,' was one of the most hated people in America with a reputation for tyrannical abuse and treatment of staff. She was the wife of billionaire real estate magnate and hotelier Harry Helmsley, and the face of his luxury hotel chain in a marketing campaign that cast herself as a queen. 'We don't pay taxes,' she once quipped to a housekeeper. 'Only the little people pay taxes'
In 1972, Harry Helmsley, the self-made billionaire divorced his first wife of 33-years to marry Leona Helmsley, a three-time divorcee, who worked as a real-estate agent in one of his brokerage firms. Harry's vast real-estate portfolio included some of New York City's most iconic buildings like the Empire State Building, the Flatiron, and Tudor City
Leona's real power began in 1980 when she was appointed president of Helmsley Hotels. The self-styled 'queen' of the Helmsley Hotels became a household name with a series of glossy ads that she ran of herself, declaring that she couldn't live without a phone in the bath, and wouldn't settle for skimpy towels, so 'why should you?'
After marrying real estate magnate Harry Helmsley in 1972, Leona became the face of her husband's hotel empire - and a symbol for the greed and excess that defined the 1980s.
'We don't pay taxes,' she once quipped to a housekeeper. 'Only the little people pay taxes.' The remark became the epitaph of the decade.
Harry was a self made multi-billionaire who worked his way up from earning $12 per week as an office boy. His vast real-estate portfolio included some of New York City's crown jewels: the Empire State Building, the Flatiron, the Graybar, the Lincoln, and Tudor City.
Leona's real power began in 1980 when she was appointed president of Helmsley Hotels. The chain included 30 different properties around the country, seven of which were luxury establishments in Manhattan such as the Park Lane Hotel, the St. Moritz and the Helmsley Palace Hotel.
The self-styled 'queen' of the Helmsley Hotels became a household name with a series of glossy ads that she ran of herself, declaring that she couldn't live without a phone in the bath, and wouldn't settle for skimpy towels, so 'why should you?'
Leona's disdain for 'little people' earned her the moniker, 'Queen of Mean.' Her reputation as a cruel and demanding employer with a hair-trigger temper was infamous.
One ad-executive who worked with her put it this way: 'Don't believe everything you've read about Leona. She's worse than that.'
She once flew into a violent rage and smashed a teacup when a hotel waiter accidentally spilled a tiny drop of water on the saucer. 'Now clean it up and beg for your job,' she reamed.
Leona was convicted of 33 felony counts of tax fraud in federal court (and charged with an additional pending 188 counts by New York State) in 1990. The Helmsleys were accused of using phony invoices to expense $4million worth of personal items to their company. Harry was ruled mentally and physically unfit to stand trial while Leona was eventually sentenced to four years in prison
After Harry Helmsley's death in 1997, Leona turned to the company of a married man. John Codey was a debonair operator with a Southern drawl who availed himself to Leona for advice, sex, companionship and long daily lunches over expensive wine
When Leona crossed paths with fellow real-estate rival, Donald Trump, she said: 'I wouldn't trust him if his tongue was notarized.' Trump found her equally loathsome in a public letter to the New York Post, which he described her as 'a total disgrace to the industry and humanity'
Leona disinherited two grandchildren from her $5billion fortune but famously left a $12million trust to her beloved dog, Trouble. The canine companion was a gift from her lover and advisor, John Codey
Former employees testified at her trial for tax fraud about how they devised a warning system that alerted fellow colleagues that the 'Queen' was en route to one of the hotels.
Sandor Frankel joined Leona Helmsley's formidable defense team in 1990, shortly after she was convicted of 33 felony counts of tax fraud. (Harry Helmsley had also been indicted, but the charges were dismissed when he was ruled mentally and physically unfit to stand trial).
Leading the battery of legal experts was Alan Dershowitz, who was hired to appeal her conviction. 'It was bound to be a heckuva ride,' said Frankel.
Leona arrived at their first meeting in Boston via her private 727 jet; flanked by security guards, bedecked in jewelry and toting large cartons of freshly made sandwiches from the Park Lane Hotel. From that day forward, 'When she whistled, I went,' wrote Frankel.
Sandor Frankel's memoir details the 18-year-long working relationship he had as Leona Helmsley's lawyer and consigliere
The Helmsleys were accused of using phony invoices to expense $4million worth of personal items to their company. Some of these extravagances included: a $1million marble dance floor for their country mansion in Connecticut, a $210,000 mahogany card table, a $130,000 stereo system, $500,000 worth of jade art objects and a $45,000 silver clock in the shape of the Helmsley Building.
$10,000 worth of dresses for Helmsley - 'size 12, with shoulder caps' - as well as a $12.99 girdle were also charged to the Park Lane Hotel but disguised on invoices at 'uniforms.'
Leona lived a supreme life of luxury. Her penthouse duplex at the Park Lane Hotel featured 360 degree 'take-your-breathe-away' views of Manhattan and an indoor pool on the second floor.
Along with properties in Florida and Arizona, her palatial Greenwich, Connecticut estate, Dunnellen Hall, was a 28-room Jacobean mansion with three pools (including a marble reflecting pond). All Frankel could see, he said, was potential 'evidence' that could be used against her in the ongoing criminal case.
Frankel eventually became Leona Helmsley's principal attorney by elimination of others. After the court rejected her appeal, Alan Dershowitz was fired in a vitriolic hailstorm of 'verbal daggers' before being ordered out of her apartment.
'Firings in the Helmsley organization were a spécialité de la maison,' wrote Sandor Frankel, who also found himself unceremoniously fired on a number of occasions.
He felt 'blindsided' by the first time Leona dismissed him without any explanation. 'Your presence won't be necessary,' she told him.
The second time Leona 'cut off communications' with Frankel because she was mad that he chose to care for his severely ill mother in the hospital - rather than defend her in a trial against a former employee that she wrongfully terminated for being gay. Leona was forced to hire another attorney who lost the trial and caused her to fork over an $11million judgement.
'There were a few other firings—I didn't know why,' he wrote in his memoir. 'She'd eventually call me as if nothing had happened.'
Leona Helmsley's personal lawyer, Sandor Frankel was listed as an executor of her $5billion estate. He recalled that Leona 'was basically a lonely lady, surrounded by household help and a dying husband'
Legal supremo, Alan Dershowitz (above) led the team of law experts hired to appeal Leona Helmsley's federal conviction of tax fraud. Sandor Frankel joined the team in 1990 and eventually became Leona's primary lawyer after Dershowitz was fired in a rage of verbal daggers' for losing the appeal
Leona was widely regarded as a 1980s symbol for arrogance, greed and excess. One housekeeper claimed that Leona routinely made a liveried servant hand feed her shrimp from a silver platter after completing every lap in her penthouse pool
'I observed fairly early that she seemed to be a prisoner of her own wealth,' said Frankel. She was eternally suspicious of everyone, both rich and poor.
When Leona became inexplicably wary of her housekeeper, she set up a sting operation by purposely leaving a $20 bill on the staircase to test if she would return it. When she crossed paths with fellow real-estate rival, Donald Trump, she said: 'I wouldn't trust him if his tongue was notarized.'
(Trump found her equally loathsome, in a scathing letter to the New York Post, he wrote: 'When God created Leona, the world received no favors.')
Helmsley had spent her first night in prison when Frankel received a panicked phone call from his infamously mercurial client. This time, Leona was paranoid that the guards were eavesdropping on her conversation, and spoke only in Yiddish.
The dutiful lawyer flew down to the Kentucky federal penitentiary where Leona vented her complaints and fears and asked to borrow a dollar to buy a bag of popcorn from the vending machine. After devouring it, she asked if her credit was good enough for a second bag.
Leona's legal troubles didn't stop after she was freed from prison early in 1994. In total she served 21 months of her four year sentence.
Frankel stepped in as her litigation lawyer in a gauntlet of civil suits. Her reputation for stiffing vendors had come back to haunt her in the free world.
'She was not enamored of paying bills,' wrote Frankel. 'And sometimes had to be saved from her own worst instincts.'
She took special pleasure in cheating the little guy - like Eugene Brennan, the contractor who installed her $13,000 custom-made barbecue pit at Dunnellen Hall. When Leona's aide pleaded with her to honor the bill, citing that Brennan had six children to support, she replied: 'Why didn't he keep his pants on? He wouldn't have so many problems.'
She also fired the engineer who installed her outdoor stereo that was designed to be like the one she saw at Disney World and serenade her while she strolled through the gazebo. But refused to pay because she thought the speakers were not properly camouflaged, the music system once turned on at 4:30am.
After Harry's death in 1997, Leona had very few people to turn to. 'With all her wealth, she was basically a lonely lady, surrounded by household help and a dying husband,' wrote Frankel.
Above, The Helmsley Building sits on Park Avenue above Grand Central Station. 'Firings in the Helmsley organization were a spécialité de la maison,' wrote Sandor Frankel, who also found himself unceremoniously fired on a number of occasions
Leona Helmsley was sentenced to four years in prison for tax evasion but was released early after two years. Frankel recalls visiting her in a 'frightened' and nervous state after spending her first night behind bars; they spoke in Yiddish because she was paranoid that the guards were eavesdropping on her conversations. Leona vented her complaints and fears and asked to borrow a dollar to buy a bag of popcorn from the vending machine. After devouring it, she asked if her credit was good enough for a second bag
Former employees testified at Leona's trial for tax fraud about how they devised a warning system that alerted fellow colleagues that the 'Queen' was en route to one of the hotels. Another business associate who worked with her said: 'Don't believe everything you've read about Leona. She's worse than that'
In 2001, Leona began a steamy affair with an optometrist named Patrick Ward. She was 80-years-old and he was 35-years her junior. She offered him a job at the Helmsley organization with an annual salary of $400,000. ended abruptly when a jealous John Codey did some sleuthing and discovered that Ward was gay. Leona fired her new lover, and was thus sued for wrongful termination
Her only son from a previous marriage, Jay Panzirer, had died at the age of 42 from heart failure in 1982; and Leona's penchant for cruelty didn't spare her four grandchildren and widowed daughter-in-law. Shortly after Panzirer's death, Leona evicted his widow and her grandson from their home in Florida, sued his estate for $146,000 with interest and charged them the cost of shipping the casket back to New York on a commercial plane.
In the vacuum of loneliness entered John Codey- a married Southerner from Kentucky who worked in real estate, and availed himself to Leona for advice, sex, companionship and long daily lunches over expensive wine.
Leona 'developed a dependent relationship with Codey—skillfully managed, I always thought, by him,' wrote Frankel.
He recalls meeting Codey for the first time at a lavish birthday party Leona threw for herself at Dunnellen Hall. She beckoned Frankel to join them at her dinner table, where Codey sat dutifully massaging her toes.
Also resting at her feet was always her beloved dog, Trouble - a new gift from Codey, which would eventually inherit a $12million trust for its proper care after Leona's death.
Trouble became the richest, most talked about and most controversial dog in New York City when a housekeeper sued Leona in 2005, claiming that the ill-mannered pooch had ferociously attacked her. Sandor Frankel, once again stepped in to litigate on behalf of the 'vicious, nondiscriminatory people-biter' and the case was dismissed.
When the pampered pet wasn't dining out at Michelin star restaurants, it was eating chef-cooked carrots and grilled chicken out of the palm of a housekeeper's hand.
'The ultra-rich take a certain lifestyle for granted,' wrote Frankel. One time Leona was forced to hitch a ride on a public yellow cab after her limo broke down on the way to lunch with John Codey. From that day forward, Codey arranged to travel in two limos, with one serving as a backup option.
Another time, Leona asked a waiter to foot the bill of an expensive Christmas gift for John Codey after she realizing that she didn't have any cash or credit on her. When the waiter explained that he didn't own a credit card, Frankel came to the rescue with his.
Then there was also the business lunch at Le Bernadin (Manhattan’s most expensive restaurant) when Leona insisted on only ordering a single cup of soup during the pre-fixe menu at $51.
In 2001, Leona found herself tabloid fodder once again at the age of 80 when she began courting a new man around town that was 35-years her junior. Her latest paramour, Patrick Ward, was an optometrist to whom she gave an executive position in the Helmsley organization with a hefty annual $400,000 salary.
As Patrick Ward's star had risen in Leona's life - John Codey's had fallen. Leona's steamy affair with Patrick Ward ended abruptly when a jealous John Codey did some sleuthing and discovered that Ward was gay. Leona fired her new lover, and was thus sued again for wrongful termination.
The Helmsleys used bogus invoices to expense $4million worth of updates to their palatial Connecticut estate, named Dunnellen Hall. Frankel called it 'a showcase of evidence' - some of these extravagances included a $1million marble dance floor, a $210,000 mahogany card table, and a $130,000 stereo system
Leona Helmsley threw lavish parties at her 28-room mansion that sat on forty acres in the toniest suburb of Connecticut. The home featured a tennis court and three pools (one for reflecting). Her famous soirees would typically begin with hors d’oeuvres and drinks served around the outdoor swimming pool, 'where no one was ever invited to swim.' The guest list included family, business acquaintances, advisors, and 'lucky sycophants' who waited to kiss the hostess' ring and marvel at how radiant she looked
John Codey was a married, father of three who began escorting Leona to social events after Harry Helmsley's death. 'Frequently, she would call me, at any hour (3:00 am didn’t matter to her), to say she’d been trying to reach him but couldn’t, and asked whether I knew where he was,' wrote Frankel.
'Despite her great wealth, or perhaps because of it, in view of her suspicious nature, she had nobody to turn to—no old friend, no trusted relative, no decades-long trusted advisor,' wrote Frankel. 'She knew she needed protection. And I was there.'
It was in this circumstance that Leona asked Sandor Frankel to rewrite her will and be one of its four executors.
Leona's new will stipulated that all the money raised from the sale of her of her real estate portfolio and personal belongings be given to the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust; a trust that Sandor Frankel was also 'surprised' to learn that he was made a trustee. (Hence his book title, The Accidental Philanthropist).
The last time Sandor Frankel saw the monarch of mean, was in a private room at a Greenwich Hospital. 'Are you comfortable,' he asked. 'I make a living,' she answered with a smile. She died a few days later at the age of 87, in 2007.
Frankel was suddenly tasked with liquidating her enormous estate that was estimated to be worth a total of $5billion and included 84 properties, $2billion in municipal bonds and another billion dollars worth of jewelry, art and furniture.
There were other assorted valuables stored in safety deposit boxes around the city that had to be drilled open. One of them contained $1.2million in cash and an assortment of diamonds. Another box held 299 gold coins in rolls of twenties.
There were 47 safe deposit boxes and two Mosler safes that turned out to be empty in the basement of Dunnellen Hall; but the hidden vault in Harry's den contained $534,800 in cash and more jewelry.
In the presence of witnesses, Frankel loaded the money and jewelry in a suitcase, wrapped in masking tape, with two witness signatures on the tape's overlap. He asked a security guard to put a combination lock on the luggage and drove home because the banks were closed.
'I hadn’t even considered the what-ifs,' he wrote. 'What if I’d been followed leaving Dunnellen Hall, or got a flat tire, or had a burglary that night and the suitcase had been stolen, or something had happened on the train ride the next morning or on my taxi ride to the bank?'
Leona's final will and testament stipulated that no money be given to two of her four grandchildren, 'for reasons which are known to them,' she wrote.
She was more generous with her other two grandchildren, whom she gave $5million each, on the provision that they visit their father's grave once yearly.
Among the personal effects Frankel discovered while liquidating Leona Helmsley's $5billion fortune were wads of cash stored in various safety deposit boxes, as well as an assortment of loose diamonds and 299 gold coins in rolls of twenties
Leona's hatred for others contrasted with her 'nearly fetishistic obsession with her husband.' She celebrated his birthday with an annual ball, known as the 'I'm Just Wild About Harry' party at their New York penthouse featuring caviar, champagne, gardenias in the pool and the Helmsleys making a dancing entrance like Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers
The bequests made to other relatives were small, grudging and controlling. Her chauffeur received $100,000, and $3million was set aside for the perpetual upkeep of her mausoleum where she is buried next to her husband, Harry. She ordered that it 'must be acid washed or steam-cleaned at least once a year.'
Much to the astonishment of everybody, Leona left the single largest bequest to her beloved canine companion - 'Trouble.' The will stated that a whopping $12million should provide for 'the care, welfare and comfort of Trouble at the highest standard.'
Tabloids ran wild with the news: HELMSLEY BONE-ANZA and LEONA’S DOG GETS HER PAWS ON $12 MILLION IN WILL, BUT THE GRANDKIDS GO BEGGING and of course the infamous New York Post headline RICH B***H.
Leona directed that custody of Trouble be given to her brother Alvin Rosenthal, or to her grandson David. But neither man wanted the dog, and eventually Trouble ended up at the home of a former employee. The canine heir was forced to hire a private security detail for his pet after it received death and dognapping threats.
Further, Leona directed that, when Trouble died, she was to be 'buried next to my remains in the Helmsley Mausoleum.'
'She often said that she could trust nobody but Trouble,' wrote Frankel. The dog was so cherished that Leona made her the star of hotel campaigns. One full page ad in the New York Times featured the white four-legged animal sitting behind a chairman-like desk with the caption, 'Let’s get down to business.'
When Frankel once asked Leona why she exclusively ran ads in the Times and not The New York Post, she answered: 'Only the little people read the Post.'
For all her distemper toward humans, she turned out to be a dog's best friend, and stated that her $8billion trust was to be given to the 'purposes related to the provision of care for dogs.'
To this day, Frankel gives away $350 million a year on behalf of the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust. Some of the causes include health and energy issues in Israel, along with medical research for ending Crohn’s disease.
For his work as executor of Leona Helmsley's will, Frankel has been compensated $100million.
He says his life has become 'surreal' since becoming the custodian of Leona's fortune.
'When you control billions of dollars, you become—I assure you—very popular,' he writes. 'My wit is now wittier, my jokes funnier, my opinions more incisive and always worth listening to.'
The last line of his memoir reads: 'All in all, in the good luck lottery that floats unpredictable in the cosmos, I hit the jackpot.'
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