Father Tells How Leah Arranged to “Take Everything” from his Dying Mother’s Home
Leah Remini’s father and his wife recall how Leah sent sister Nicole to his dying mother’s apartment, with orders to “take everything”—cleaning out all money, jewelry and valuables.
TRANSCRIPT:
DANA: She [Leah] uses her sister, Nicole, to do her dirty work. So she can, if anything comes—if anything happens, “Oh, not me. Not me.”
GEORGE: The neighbor, Valerie, was listed as the executor of the estate [mother’s estate]. But before making a move, she called Leah and Nicole. Mostly Leah. And she told her, “Listen, your grandmother’s got this, that, the other thing. And what, you know, do you want to do?” She says, “Well, I’m going to send Nicole. And you know, you just show her where everything is and let her take everything.”
DANA: Leah sent like a red-eye for Nicole to go there, fly there?
GEORGE: Yeah, yeah.
DANA: Yeah, a red-eye.
GEORGE: Yeah, a red-eye she sent. So, you know, I’m like—
DANA: You know, so that was, like, pretty swift.
GEORGE: “I’ve come to—Dad, I’ve come to see grandma.” I said, “Oh, that’s nice of you. Where’s your sister?” “Oh, she doesn’t want to come.” “Alright.” You know, Leah doesn’t want to come. “Why not? You told me you wanted to do a documentary on your grandmother. You know, coming from Italy and all this stuff. And you know, now you don’t even want to look at her?” While my mother was laying there dying, they were—or rather Nicole was—going through all the drawers, picking up everything, getting her jewelry. You know, as she’s laying there in the bed. And you’re taking all the stuff and you’re putting it in your bag.
DANA: Yeah and that was orders from Vicki and Leah, “Take everything.”
GEORGE: Take everything.
DANA: Because they’re money hungry.
GEORGE: My mother had—she doesn’t believe in banks. So she had some money in the bank, a lot of money in the house, and Nicole went through everything. Like with a vacuum cleaner. You know, like you take your fingerprints off of everything? She went through the whole house and took everything she wanted. She took all the monies from the house, all the money from the banks, her retirement money, everything. You know, do you really need my mother’s wedding ring?
DANA: Right.
GEORGE: Do you really need that?
DANA: And you couldn’t give that to him? He didn’t have anything, you know what I mean?
GEORGE: And not that I wanted to sell it or anything.
DANA: See, they don’t want him to have anything. It’s like they want to punish him. And you go, “For what? For what reason?”
GEORGE: I just can’t understand it. I was brought up totally different. And she was brought up to respect the people that you know and love. But I guess California and money did a lot to her.
