Mindfreak magician Criss Angel has been hauled into court by a 37-year-old Long Island woman claiming to be his wife of five years—and her lawyer plans to subpoena Hollywood blonde bombshell Cameron Diaz to support the divorce suit!

Attorney Dominic Barbara, who has represented several celebrity clients, claims that Criss’ wife, Joanne Sarantakos, had actually been involved with the Luxor resort-hotel casino based magician for 15 years. “He kept his wife a secret to increase his sex appeal to female fans” shrilled the attorney.

The romance between Criss and Cameron only began two months ago after I was with them when they met backstage at a music awards show in Mandalay Bay. Although they were seen at the Bellagio, The Mirage and the Hard Rock over two consecutive weekends their show-business schedules have kept them apart most of the time while she was on two separate world tours promoting her latest Shrek movie. Criss was in Manhattan promoting the third season of his A&E Mindfreak show with a Houdini escape from a suspended concrete coffin, and in Montreal planning his new Cirque du Soleil magic show expected to open at the Luxor in 14-months time, late August 2008. Criss did give a “shout-out” to Cameron when he escaped from the 24-hour imprisonment and was discovered on nearby poster scaffolding promoting his Mindfreak debut. Click here for our previous Luxe Life coverage of Criss’ stunt and successful premiere party at the Luxor upon his return.

Criss was previously linked with another show-business star, Minnie Driver, and they were also seen around town, including a shopping lunch at the Caesars Palace Forum Shops. Criss never hid from me the fact that he was married-separated for a long time and going through a difficult divorce. However I’m convinced that early this year he thought the dissolution of the marriage was being resolved amicably

But yesterday (Friday, June 29) it all exploded in NY State Supreme Court in Mineola, Long Island when according to the New York Post, attorney Barbara outrageously claimed that 39-year-old Criss had refused to pay her support during the “abusive” relationship. He said he’d even hired a private investigator to tail the magician for the past six months. In the series of outrageous “divorce lawyer” allegations Barbara, who once represented sleazy Long Island ‘Lolita” auto-mechanic Joey Buttafucco, also claimed that Criss had failed to send a $7,000 check for household expenses that never arrived. The lawyer and the “wife” ridiculously claimed the marriage broke down when the illusionist became famous and got involved with Cameron Diaz.

“This is a classic case of a star-shakedown,” said one of the magician’s pals. “The moment Cirque made the announcement of his $200-million magic production all the money-thirsting past came out to see how much they could grab. It’s disgraceful they’re going after Criss this way and using the legal system to hurt him. He moved to Vegas several years ago and they’ve hardly seen each other since, so to claim Cameron broke up their marriage is totally ridiculous.”

Criss, who still has relatives on Long Island where he used to live, attended the court hearing with his attorney Elliot Weiner and although both declined any comment Criss flashed a “peace V sign” afterwards.

Luxe Life will continue to monitor this ugly legal battle as it moves forward.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 30th, 2007 at 2:29 pm and is filed under Misc. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.