A troubled woman with a “zombie-like state of mind” is terrorizing a fancy uptown co-op by urinating in elevators, vomiting on floors and smearing feces on the walls, according to a new lawsuit begging for her to stop.
April Eidelberg’s years of disturbing behavior also includes odorous personal hygiene and drinking booze in the trash and laundry rooms of the posh building, where a one-bedroom unit recently went for $1.5 million, residents and workers claim in court papers.
“There is no other person I’ve encountered quite like Defendant April Eidelberg,” the president of the co-op board claimed in a court filing, calling her a “troubled person and by far the most serious problem in the Building.”
Her mother and roommate, retired psychologist Linda Eidelberg, is also being sued for not helping her adult daughter curb her disturbing behavior, according to the lawsuit filed by the co-op board of the fancy Upper East Side tower.
Now the building is asking a judge for a restraining order to end the chaos, and threatens the mother and daughter with possible “ejectment” from the co-op.
“This seems to be a recipe for disaster,” wrote their downstairs neighbor in a court filing, “and given her zombie-like state of mind and apparent lack of supervision, I have no idea what she is capable of doing.”
The co-op board’s lawyer declined to comment further on the lawsuit.
When asked by a reporter, April, 59, denied the allegations, and says that some of the alleged incidents may stem from medical issues which affect her bladder and have occasionally triggered seizures in the past.
The former NYC public school tutor said she quit drinking “at least” a few years ago, and that the lawsuit surprised her.
“I guess humans are two-faced, because everyone smiles at me and I smile at them,” she said. “So I don’t get where this is coming from.”
Her mother declined to comment.
Linda first moved into 201 East 79th Street in 2007, one neighbor attests in an affirmation filed alongside the lawsuit on Tuesday in Manhattan Supreme Court.
But things took a turn when April moved in with her at least seven years ago.
Downstairs neighbor Deborah Koenigsberg can “vividly recall” when she first met April, “because she appeared to be utterly filthy, odorous, and had ragged clothes on,” she wrote in a sworn court affirmation.
“I can definitively state that everyone at the Building knows when and where April Eidelberg is or was based upon these things alone,” said the board president, Jason Cole.
When the current building manager was hired in 2021, he said his predecessor tipped him off to April’s behavior, according to his affirmation.
There have been “at least a dozen” incidents involving April since then, his statement reads, including “vomiting, urinating, and defecating” in the building’s common spaces, drinking booze and appearing “visibly intoxicated.”
In March, a valet and porter found April passed out in a service elevator and smelling of alcohol, according to filed incident reports.
Another report from February says April left a trail of blood after stumbling in the building’s hallways. She told The Post she was injured on a rocky beach that day, and said she didn’t see any blood on the floor.
After April fell outside due to an apparent seizure earlier this year, her mother said April was not taking her prescribed anti-seizure medication, according to an incident report filed by the building
Starting in 2022, the board sent five letters repeating the lurid accusations, including claims that she vomited and urinated in the hallway outside of her apartment and smeared feces on building walls.
When asked about the alleged smearing incident, April simply replied, “Uh, no.”
One letter from last June cites a recent episode that month where she was so “publicly drunk and intoxicated” that she “needed to be helped back to the building by several persons.”
“If you are unwilling or unable to ensure that your daughter gets the appropriate care that she clearly needs, [the board] will act to protect its interest, and those of its many other residents,” the letter concludes.
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