It doesn't pay to be a rich bitch.
TROUBLE HIGH-TAILS IT AFTER DEATH THREATS
By LARRY CELONA and DAREH GREGORIAN
December 3, 2007 -- It's more money, more problems for Leona Helmsley's $12 million dog, Trouble.
The poor little rich bitch has been wintering in Florida after being targeted by death threats up North, The Post has learned.
Trouble turned tail from the 28-room Connecticut estate where she had been staying after her caretakers received approximately two dozen threats against the petite pooch, who became a celebrity earlier this year after Helmsley died and left her a $12 million trust fund.
The dog - under an assumed name - was flown by private plane with her security team to a Helmsley property in the Sarasota area about two months ago, sources said.
A spokesman for Helmsley organization, Howard Rubenstein, declined comment.
John Codey, the Helmsley executive in charge of the pooch's trust fund, said Trouble is being well taken care of.
He estimated the cost of her upkeep - including security, medical care and grooming - to be well over $300,000 a year. The Maltese chows down on meals prepared by chefs.
Most households in New York City made only a hair above $38,000 as of 1999 and more than 21 percent of families were living below the poverty line - about $13,000 - in 2006.
Helmsley's will called for Trouble to be taken in by her brother, Alvin Rosenthal. But he snubbed the dog, leaving her to be cared for by Helmsley employees at her Dunnellen Hall estate and in Florida.
Trouble's penchant for biting people has earned her many enemies over the years, but Codey said he has been astonished at the animosity toward her.
"I think the reaction was really quite bizarre," he told CBS's "The Early Show" last week.
"We received any number of threats to kidnap the dog, so that was a major problem for us after Leona passed away."
He said that the 41/2-pound pooch has a rotating security team and used an alias when she flew out of Connecticut.
"We've had problems keeping her identity confidential, and we had to change her name even to take her on the aircraft. We called her Bauble instead of Trouble," he said.
Codey doesn't expect Trouble to chomp through her entire trust fund. He said whatever remains after her death will go into Helmsley's charitable fund, which eventually could top $6 billion.
