Children of the Band’s late Robbie Robertson, a long-time collaborator with Martin Scorcese and Bob Dylan, are claiming elder abuse in a new legal action against his widow.
Robertson died last year, just months after a private marriage to Janet Zuccarini. His three adult children — Alexandra, Delphine and Sebastian Robertson — filed suit against the Toronto restaurateur in Los Angeles Superior Court.
“This lawsuit is a meritless fiction and the truth will prevail,” said Zuccarini attorney Gabrielle Vidal, told the Los Angeles Times. “This is a gross and exploitative attempt by Robbie Robertson’s children to eviscerate their father’s expressed wishes for his beloved wife Janet.”
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The younger Robertsons say his intent upon death was for his children to become 50 percent owners of a Beverly Hills home that Zuccarini and Robertson jointly purchased from David Geffen for $6 million in 2021. (The suit alleges that Robertson put down the entire $1.8-million down payment.) His heirs would then be free to sell the property to Zuccarini, buy out her share or jointly sell.
Instead, Zuccarini has informed the family that “she was entitled to reside in the property until her death — and that [Robertson’s heirs] were required to pay, from what would have been their modest inheritance, the mortgage, property taxes, insurance, and half of the daily property maintenance expenses for the duration of her life,” according to the lawsuit.
His heirs say the elder abuse stems from Zuccarini’s insistence that Robertson sign documents when he was not capable of understanding them. The lawsuit argues that he never fully recovered after a 2022 cancer-related surgery, and was using powerful opioids, THC and antipsychotics to manage the pain.
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“Robertson’s mental state was severely impaired,” the Robertson children’s attorney says. “These drugs he was taking, in the period of time when Zuccarini was arranging the secret wedding and having him sign oppressive documents, are known to have significant effects on cognition – including confusion, hallucinations, torpor, depression, memory loss, and dissociation.”
Property ownership was changed when the couple amended a Tenant in Common agreement just months before Robertson died in August 2023. A copy of the new agreement was included in the legal action and now states that if one of them were to die, the estate would assume responsibility for paying off the deceased’s half of the mortgage.
Robertson’s heirs are asking the court to cancel the agreement. They did not immediately offer comments to the Times through their attorney.
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