How real estate’s Alexander brothers got away with decades of alleged sexual assault: ‘They are a menace.’

Later that same day, the college student was taking a shower when one of the Alexander twins — she couldn’t recall which one, as they are identical — got in. It was “aggressive,” she said. “I didn’t know how to react.” She said the twin picked her up and carried her “soaking wet” to a bedroom, where they proceeded to have sex.

“I didn’t feel like I could say no,” she said, adding that she “was young and naive and kind of in a powerless position.”

For years, it was an open secret in wealthy social circles that the Alexander twins, now 37, and their older brother Tal mistreated women. (Oren and Tal are top real-estate brokers who started out at Douglas Elliman before launching their own firm, Official; Alon works for the family’s security company in Florida.) In June, The Real Deal reported that two women, Kate Whiteman and Rebecca Mandel, had filed civil lawsuits against Oren and Alon earlier this year. Whiteman and Mandel said the brothers took turns raping them in two separate incidents in 2010 and 2012, respectively. Ten days after the article ran, Angelica Parker filed a lawsuit accusing Alon and Tal of raping her in their Soho apartment in 2012 while Oren watched. In July, a fourth woman, the actor and comedian Renée Willett, filed a lawsuit against Oren, accusing him of drugging and raping her in his Soho apartment in 2015. The FBI is investigating allegations against them, The Wall Street Journal reported. (The FBI declined to comment.)

I didn’t feel like I could say no

In the past three months, more than a dozen women have said they were raped or assaulted by the three brothers, sometimes in tandem. Business Insider has spoken to four women who described being assaulted or feeling coerced into sexual encounters, including one who said Tal, now 38, raped her in Las Vegas in 2017. In August, Evan Torgan, the attorney representing Whiteman and Mandel, said he planned to file multiple new lawsuits against the brothers.

Rae, who attended Miami Country Day School at the same time the Alexanders were in high school and asked to be identified by her middle name, said a male friend who spent time with the brothers warned her to stay away from them. “The community we were in, people talk all the time,” she said. “None of this was hidden. It was out there.”

Nonetheless, the brothers seemed to avoid repercussions. People in the community were spooked by the fact that the Alexander family owned a security firm, said one Miami Country Day School student who knew the Alexanders in high school. The brothers would try to “scare people off,” he said. “They would be like, ‘We’re friends with the police.'”

A high-school classmate of the Alexanders said the brothers seemed untouchable. “They were always the rich, mean kids,” he said, “who knew they would never have any consequences because their father or their parents would make it go away.”

Hofeldt said she’d seen the Alexander brothers around at parties before she met them during the 2003-2004 school year. She had recently transferred from an all-girls school in New York to Miami Country Day School.

One night, while she was staying at her friend’s house in Aventura, an affluent Miami suburb, Hofeldt and her friend snuck out to a house party nearby.

Hofeldt’s friend was chatting with some boys from Krop, including Tal, Oren, and Alon. Before long, the group of boys said there was another party nearby and offered to give the two girls a ride. Hofeldt remembers it as a large, white home with expansive windows and lots of Formica. But when they arrived, there was no one else there — and certainly no party.

Hofeldt and her friend sat with the handful of boys on a round couch. She took a shot of Bacardi 151 offered to her.

Shortly afterward, Hofeldt said she ended up in a bedroom while her friend stayed in the other room with one of the Alexanders’ friends, looking at a computer. In the bedroom, the three Alexander brothers forced her onto the bed and held her down while their friend stayed by the door. One of the twins held her arms, the other held her legs, and Tal got on top of her; they pulled at her clothes.

“He was really aggressive with me,” she said. Realizing what Tal was trying to do, she struggled to escape and tore off Tal’s necklace — a gold die on a chain.

Hofeldt managed to get up, but she said one of the boys ran at her with an arm outstretched and clotheslined her, flipping her onto the floor. She got to her feet as the boys grabbed her from behind and spotted another boy outside the window. Hofeldt said he was holding a metallic camcorder and appeared to be filming the encounter.

Hofeldt ran out of the room and reunited with her friend. Two of the Alexanders’ friends drove them back to her friend’s house. During the car ride home, her hands were shaking, and she said she felt like she was in “shock.”

“In a way, he was so close to Howard he was untouchable,” said one former Elliman employee who worked with Oren in Miami. “He was Howard’s adopted son, if you will.” (A Douglas Elliman spokesperson said it was “inaccurate” that the Alexander brothers were close to Lorber and said the chairman “is a friend and mentor to many agents.”)

The two brothers quickly became known for their aggressive tactics — which seemed to pay off. Oren’s first major deal was an $8 million Manhattan penthouse that he sold in 2009 to a family friend, the attorney James Ferraro. (Ferraro briefly represented Oren and Alon in their rape lawsuits this year.) Two years later, Oren landed a spot on the Forbes 30 under 30 list.

As Tal made inroads in New York City, Oren took the lead on Florida deals. In 2012, they sold a Miami Beach spec mansion built by their father for $47 million, breaking the record for the most expensive single-family home ever sold in the Miami area. In 2019, about a decade into their real-estate careers, the brothers represented the hedge-fund billionaire Ken Griffin in his purchase of a $238 million Manhattan penthouse, which remains the priciest home sale in US history. Two years later, the Alexanders were ranked Douglas Elliman’s top team by gross commission income and sales volume in both New York and Florida, according to The Real Deal.

Oren and Tal flaunted their success on Instagram, posting photos of themselves golfing in the Dominican Republic or electric-foil boarding in Malibu to their 80,000-plus combined followers. They were photographed at New York Fashion Week shows and Art Basel parties and spent New Year’s in St. Bart’s. Oren’s opulent wedding to a Brazilian model in the Florida Keys in April 2023 was featured in Vogue. (Alon married a model in 2020, while Tal married a financial recruiting entrepreneur in fall 2023.) “They were always at whatever the cool spot was and the fun parties in the Hamptons,” a woman who worked at Elliman at the same time as the Alexanders said. “They always had tables when we were out and about so they were always offering people drinks.”

In 2021, Barbara Fox of Fox Residential Group butted heads with Tal after her firm brought a client to see a $10 million unit at the newly built Upper East Side condo building The Beckford. After the showing, Tal called Fox’s client and persuaded the client to work with him instead, telling him that he would be unlikely to get the unit otherwise. Fox ultimately had to split her commission with Tal. She later reported him, and in October 2022, Tal was censured by the Real Estate Board of New York for interfering with another broker’s client relationship.

“He’s ruthless,” Fox said of Tal. “He stole money from me.”

The Elliman spokesperson said, “Any allegation regarding inappropriate business practices by Elliman agents are thoroughly investigated and properly handled according to our policies and procedures.”

When Miami’s Faena House penthouse sold for a record-breaking $60 million in 2015, Oren was prominently featured in the press for closing the deal, despite being minimally involved in the sale, according to Douglas Elliman’s Erik Schneider, the director of sales for Faena House, who brokered the deal with Jeff Miller of Brown Harris Stevens, who represented the buyer. A former Douglas Elliman employee told BI that Oren would be the first to give his name to the media to get credit for deals: He was “very press hungry,” she said.

The way Oren and Tal handled the biggest deal of their careers, Ken Griffin’s $238 million penthouse, aggravated Griffin so much that the billionaire ultimately had his lawyer send a letter complaining about the brothers’ conduct.

When sales launched for 220 Central Park South, the 70-story luxury skyscraper on Billionaires’ Row, in 2015, Tal sent Griffin marketing materials for the tower. Assuming that Tal was representing the building, Griffin agreed to a tour.

But when Griffin met the Alexander brothers in the lobby, he was surprised to find that they were there to act as his personal brokers, according to a real-estate agent with knowledge of the deal and a source close to Griffin. Another broker, from Corcoran, was there as the building’s representative.

After confirming that Tal didn’t represent the building, Griffin called Howard Lorber to ask him to represent him in the deal instead. Griffin felt Tal was too inexperienced, the source close to Griffin said. Lorber agreed to take on the deal. But when news of the sale became public in January 2019, The Wall Street Journal, The Real Deal, and other outlets reported that the Alexander team had represented Griffin in his purchase. Business Insider published a story on the deal, and Douglas Elliman’s spokesperson emailed the reporter asking her to include Tal and Oren’s names as the buyer’s brokers.

At one point in the evening, Oren and Alon approached Lee and the woman and immediately started behaving aggressively, Lee said. “They are pushing her away from me and then one of the brothers is pushing me away as if two bouncers are trying to remove someone.”

“These guys just came in like a hurricane,” Lee continued. The twins surrounded the woman, and one of the brothers tried to insert his finger into the woman’s vagina, Lee said. “She screamed when it happened.”

The twins then ushered the woman toward a hotel room they had by the pool, Lee said.

Later that night, Lee saw Oren and Alon again. They showed Lee an up-close photo of the woman’s genitals.

“They were showing their accomplishment,” he said. “An adult sees that and immediately knows it’s wrong.” At the time, Lee “just thought it was scummy,” but the incident stuck with him for years, he said.

Allegations of assault followed the brothers over the next decade.

In 2010, Oren and Alon drugged and raped a woman named Rebecca Mandel in New York City, according to the lawsuit filed by Mandel. In 2012, Kate Whiteman was leaving a nightclub when the twins forcefully pulled her into a black SUV and drove her to a party at Sir Ivan’s Castle, a sprawling mansion in Water Mill famous for its lavish theme parties, her lawsuit says. Her phone and belongings were placed in a locker that was locked by Oren, who kept the key. The twins then led her to a large bedroom and “sexually assaulted, abused, raped, pinned, groped, harassed, battered, and fondled” her, the lawsuit says.

During the weekend in East Hampton in June 2017, when Oren and Alon celebrated their 30th birthday, one female guest who was 22 and working at Douglas Elliman at the time was alarmed when a girl the brothers brought home confided that her cell had been taken from her before she could enter the house.

Another woman, Beth, who was also a houseguest, told BI she had an uncomfortable experience with the Alexanders that same weekend. Beth, who asked to be identified by her middle name for fear the brothers might retaliate, was an 18-year-old model at the time. She had met Alon at a nightclub several months earlier and he agreed to fly her and two friends from out of state to the Hamptons for the weekend, Beth said.

A few days before the trip, Alon messaged Beth on Instagram and asked if she had “a cute gf” who could join her.

I remember being very uncomfortable, drunk, and confused

A few days before the trip, Alon messaged Beth on Instagram and inundated her with questions about how wild she and her friends would be. Beth messaged Alon that “I have no intentions of fucking anyone I just don’t want that to be expected or anything.”

“Won’t be expected by anyone except maybe me,” Alon replied with a wink emoji.

“No like seriously lol,” she said, adding later: “I’m not going in planning to fuck u or anyone.”

“Me and my friends are going to have fun, not be prostitutes idk what u want me to tell you,” she added. “We just want it to be clear we aren’t obligated to do anything we aren’t comfortable with.”

One day, the college student said, Oren, Alon, and Tal “forced” her into a hotel room. The twins suddenly left.

She immediately felt ill at ease given her past experience with the twins. Tal started trying to have sex with her. She said she told Tal “no” multiple times and tried to leave the room, but he was aggressive, she said, and forced her to stay. Then, he raped her, she said.

When she came out of the room, the twins told the college student not to tell anyone about what had happened.

“Again, I was so naive I couldn’t believe anyone would do anything like that,” she said. “That was really shocking.”

Another woman on the Vegas trip, who was also 18 at the time, told BI she remembered hearing about Tal and the college student from someone else on the trip.

For many people watching the news about the brothers unfold, what’s been most disturbing is just how many people knew about their alleged behavior. Sara Militello, a former real-estate agent, said she was warned not to leave her drink by the Alexander brothers when she met them at a Hamptons party around 2015. “It’s disgusting that the industry hadn’t shunned them earlier,” she said.

As more allegations have surfaced, the brothers have laid low. After announcing in June that they were taking leave from Official, Oren and Tal deactivated their Instagram accounts; Alon made his private. Rumors swirled online that the brothers had fled the country. Star brokers began leaving Official, and two developers — including Stern of JDS Development — dropped the firm from their Miami condo projects. Behind the scenes, on a call with partners in late June, the brothers “agreed to withdraw from the company and the paperwork was shared with them to sign,” according to Nicole Oge, an Official cofounder.

Cinque, the brothers’ attorney, told BI in August that Oren and Tal never agreed to leave Official. “They want to continue with the business,” Cinque said. In a written statement to BI, the brothers said their brokerage will “continue to offer and provide the finest quality services in the industry.” That same month, the New York Post reported that the brothers were harassing some of their alleged victims’ families.

Deanna Paul, a New York attorney who represents Tal, said, “In due time the truth will come out. We look forward to our day in court.”

In July, BI spoke to a former girlfriend of Oren’s who had talked to Oren after he was first accused of rape in June.

“He sounded upset and kind of like you can tell when there’s a quiver in somebody’s voice,” she said.

But Oren remained positive. As he told her: “‘It’ll all get dealt with.'”

Daniel Geiger contributed reporting.

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