THAT’S QUITE A FEET: Beth Shak shows off her vast collection of size-7 high-heel designer shoes, for which ex-husband Daniel Shak had sued so he could sell them. (Chad Rachman/New York Post)
Daniel Shak
KICK THE HABIT: Beth Shak leaves court in her $700 YSL stilettos after testifying yesterday about her insatiable need to buy expensive shoes. (NYP)
She had a fever for pricey footwear.
A pretty pro poker player battling her ex-hubby over 1,200 pairs of designer shoes she’d stashed in their posh Fifth Avenue pad called her inability to say no to high heels a “sickness” she couldn’t cure.
“It really was a sickness, it was like a disease,” Beth Shak told The Post outside court yesterday, sporting a $700 pair of beige Yves St. Laurent stilettos.
“There was such a lack of emotion and love in my relationship that I filled that void with shopping. I was shopping endlessly, I couldn’t stop,” said Shak, 51, who’s played on the professional poker circuit since 2004.
Her ex, hedge-fund titan Daniel Shak, had filed a lawsuit looking for a payday from the sale of the shoes, but abruptly dropped the legal action yesterday after several hours of testimony.
The stunning brunette — who has an image of a Christian Louboutin stiletto tattooed on her pelvic bone — said Shak would even give her the brushoff when she came looking for love.
“I wanted love and emotional support and affection, but there was nothing. He would say, ‘Stop! Get away from me!’ I tried to keep track of what I was buying, but I lost control,” she said outside the eastern Pennsylvania courthouse.
“He would always say, ‘I’m busy! Leave me alone! Just go shopping or something!’ And I would give in and just go do it.”
Her obsession with size-7 heels from Louis Vuitton, Alexander McQueen, Louboutin and YSL led her to spend around $1 million on fancy footwear.
“God only knows how many pairs of shoes I’ve bought in a week,” said Shak, who ultimately amassed a collection that would be the envy of Imelda Marcos.
The mom of two kids from a previous relationship insisted she tried to rekindle her romance with Shak and to curb her compulsive shopping, but he rebuffed her.
“I tried to get him to go to therapy with me. But it just didn’t work. I was so unhappy with my marriage that all I did was shop. There was nothing to our relationship. He and I had nothing,” she said.
During testimony yesterday at the Montgomery County Courthouse, Beth told a similar story.
“I would not call these shoes a collection, I would call them a sickness at a particular point in my life,” she told Judge Ronda Daniele.
Daniel Shak, who now lives in Las Vegas and the Hamptons, claimed he was unaware of the collection in their Museum Mile apartment near East 86th Street and wanted the shoes sold for 35 percent of their value.
But Beth Shak testified that her hubby knew all about the shoes and signed off on all the detailed bills for them. Her testimony apparently wore him down.
Late in the afternoon, Daniel Shak, 53, stunned the court by suddenly telling his lawyer to withdraw the suit.
The judge quickly OK’d the request, telling Daniel, “Well, thanks for wasting everybody’s time.”
“It was pretty obvious he knew he was going to lose,” Beth Shak cracked. “Dan looked like a buffoon in there.”
Beth, meanwhile, admitted she is still battling her obsession.
“My closet is in complete chaos,” she said about her new home in suburban Philadelphia. “It’s a disaster. I spend three or four hours a day in there trying to clean it up and keep it neat.”