An Upper East Side celebrity dermatologist famed for his pricey beauty potions is neck-deep in a legal battle with financial backers who claim he skinned them out of millions of dollars.
Steven Victor – dubbed “Dr. Lookgood” by his wealthy devotees – has been sued in both federal and state court by a group of Texas investors who gave him a $2.5 million cash injection to build his cash-strapped beauty empire, court records show.
“Virtually as soon as the ink was dry” on the deal, the Manhattan federal suit claims, Victor and his socialite wife, Anna Rhodes, used $43,000 of the proceeds on a trip to Paris, staying at “one of Europe’s most expensive resorts.”
They allegedly used another $49,000 to pay off their personal American Express bill.
In the first three months after the deal closed, the Victors – operating at the time as Victor Cosmeceuticals Inc. – racked up $600,000 in unauthorized personal expenses, according to the suit.
Victor, with Rhodes, markets a line of anti-aging skin-care products that run from $100 for a half-ounce of “Miracle Serum” to $755 for a sixpack of washes.
The limelight-loving doc counts Jade Jagger, Sarah Ferguson and Sharon Osborne among his devotees.
Victor has been successfully sued in the past by several suppliers, lenders and business associates. They claimed fraud, unpaid loans, misuse of funds and refusal to pay bills, records show.
Billionaire drug-company honcho Stewart Rahr famously got Victor to cough up $200,000 in 2006 after Rahr sent picketers to stand outside the doctor’s East 76th Street private practice with fliers that read, “Dr. Steven Victor, Dermatologist May Make Your Skin Crawl.”
At the time, Rahr had a judgment against Victor for an unpaid loan.
In July, the Texas investors hit the Victors with a suit in Manhattan Supreme Court, asking a judge to order VCI to pay up.
They also want all VCI inventory and other assets that the Victors put up as collateral.
The Victors defaulted on $1.3 million of their debt in July 2006 and the balance in January 2007.
In May that year, the Victors shuttered VCI and re-invented it as Victor Products Inc., the state suit claims.