Real estate developer and former gubernatorial candidate Stephen Cloobeck is facing felony charges for allegedly threatening victims in his fiancee’s criminal case that involved accusations that she stole from wealthy men across Los Angeles County.
Cloobeck, 64, was arrested on Tuesday before 11 a.m. and booked at the West Hollywood station on suspicion of attempting to prevent or dissuade witnesses from testifying. He was freed that afternoon after posting $300,000 bail, according to Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department jail booking records.
Model and social media influencer Adva Lavie, 29, who is engaged to Cloobeck, is accused of burglarizing the homes of wealthy older men and younger women she’d met online.
Cloobeck did not respond to requests for comment, but his attorney denied the allegations on his behalf.
“These charges are false and we look forward to our day in court,” attorney Elias Dabaie said in a statement to The Times.
A felony arrest warrant filed in Los Angeles Superior Court alleges that Cloobeck tried to prevent three male victims from giving testimony in the case. Prosecutors allege in the document that the offenses were “committed by force and an express and implied threat of force and violence upon a victim.”
The former gubernatorial candidate is also facing a misdemeanor count for annoying phone calls after he allegedly contacted Lavie’s attorney, Lou Shapiro, swore at him and threatened him, his property and members of his family, according to the complaint.
Shapiro declined to comment when reached by The Times on Wednesday.
Cloobeck made his money in the timeshare and hospitality industry. He founded Diamond Resorts, a Las Vegas-based timeshare company, in 1992, and sold it to a private equity firm in 2016 for $2.2 billion.
He became immersed in Democratic politics while in Nevada and frequently described the late Sen. Harry Reid as a “father figure.” A framed letter from the legendary politician hangs in Cloobeck’s Beverly Hills mansion and the former Senate Majority Leader wrote a blurb on the back of Cloobeck’s 2018 book “Checking In: Hospitality-Driven Thinking, Business, and You.”
“Stephen Cloobeck’s book covers the life of a modern-day business genius,” Reid wrote. “I’ve known him for decades, and he has never changed. He is cocky, self-assured, aggressive, arrogant, self-confident, and always focused. He’s not afraid to confront anyone (including me) when he feels it’s appropriate. But when the brashness passes, and it does quickly, one sees a person with a social conscience, a person who is known for his generosity. Stephen Cloobeck is a good person, a creator of thousands of jobs, an innovator, and to many, a friend.”
Cloobeck was instrumental in getting the Las Vegas airport renamed after Reid in 2021. He also appeared on two seasons of “Undercover Boss,” a reality show in which corporate executives take lower level jobs within their companies to discover how things operate day to day.
For a short time last year, Cloobeck was among the crowded field running for state governor with the slogan “California, get a Cloo”.
But he bowed out in November, announcing on CNN he was throwing his support behind then-Congressman Eric Swalwell.
It was the philanthropist’s first-ever political campaign, which he funded through a fortune amassed in the real estate industry. In a UC Berkeley poll co-sponsored by The Times last fall, Cloobeck received less than half of 1% of the support of registered voters.
According to Los Angeles County prosecutors, Cloobeck’s fiance, Lavie, from 2023 to 2025, used dating apps and cultivated relationships to burglarize and steal from victims in Westlake Village, West Hollywood, Los Angeles and Beverly Hills. She allegedly went by the name Mia Ventura.
Lavie allegedly posed as a girlfriend and travel companion to gain access to victims’ homes and then stole cash, gold and designer items, prosecutors said.
She has pleaded not guilty to two counts of unauthorized use of personal identifying information, two counts of grand theft, one count of first-degree residential burglary with person present and one count of first-degree residential burglary, all felonies.
If convicted of all charges, Lavie faces up to 11 years and eight months in state prison.
Lavie and Cloobeck, who is Jewish, were expected to get married in Israel next month, but a ceremony there cannot happen because of her pending criminal case. Lavie is out of custody, but is wearing an ankle monitor and cannot leave the country, according to a source not authorized to discuss the case with the media.
For Cloobeck, this isn’t the first time a romance has been embroiled in scandal.
At the end of his 22-year marriage, Cloobeck became involved with Stefanie Gurzanski, an OnlyFans model who he later sued in 2021 alleging fraud.
The lawsuit alleged she took “advantage of Cloobeck’s generosity, over the course of their relationship.” Cloobeck said he spent about $1.3 million purchasing Gurzanski designer bags, watches, clothing, shoes and treating her to luxurious meals with caviar, crab legs, premium champagne and tequila in their five-month courtship.
“It is really simple. I got extorted. I never get extorted. I found out that person extorted five other people,” Cloobeck told The Times in a prior interview. “Guess what? No one gets extorted on my watch when I’m in charge, because I’m principled, I fight.”
Gurzanski denied the allegations and her lawyer alleged in court papers she was “incessantly harassed” by Cloobeck even after she was granted a temporary restraining order.
In a motion for a protective order filed in court in April 2021, Gurzanski’s attorney alleges that Cloobeck set out to “destroy, bankrupt, punish and jail” his client if she did not quit OnlyFans and marry him. The attorney wrote in the document that Cloobeck posted Gurzanski’s address online after she broke up with him in what the attorney described as attempt to incite her stalker to go to her home and hurt her.
“I’m on a 150ft yacht with a brand new woman that’s loves me and represents me as a woman,” Cloobeck wrote in a text message to Gurzanski, which was filed in court. “And she getting the 7 carat ring. Just for her respect that you didn’t show me. Enjoy jail.”
It is not clear what woman Cloobeck was referring to in the message.
“Stephen J. Cloobeck is an is an immature, angry and petty man who refuses to accept that he cannot control women using his influence and wealth. He has no qualms abusing the legal system in order to impose his will,” attorney Arthur Barens wrote in the motion.
When he announced his candidacy for governor in 2024, Cloobeck said he was running because he could not find a single qualified candidate — until he endorsed Swalwell. The one-time candidate was a top donor for Swalwell, pouring roughly $1 million into an independent political committee backing Swalwell’s campaign, according to state campaign finance disclosures.
But after Swalwell exited the race and resigned from Congress amid a sex scandal last month, Cloobeck quickly announced that Swalwell no longer had his support. Swalwell has denied the allegations against him.
Cloobeck told The Times in a prior interview that he’d known the congressman for a decade and Swalwell had stayed at his home after the allegations became public. But he had since cut ties with Swalwell and was “shocked” by the sexual misconduct and assault accusations.
He also said he was leaving the Democratic Party and now identifies as a libertarian.
“You know, one thing you know me for is that I am unapologetically authentic, and it’s really simple, we have integrity,” he said. “I have integrity, okay? I am known for that. I am disappointed. I am disgusted…”
“The truth always comes out,” he added.
Times staff writers Summer Lin, Clara Harter and deputy editor Joseph Serna contributed to this report.