Judges were today urged to prevent wealthy husbands from using a “cheats charter” to hide their fortunes as a landmark divorce battle began at the Supreme Court.
The case involves Nigerian oil tycoon Michael Prest and his estranged English wife Yasmin and a dispute over whether assets allegedly worth hundreds of millions of pounds that are held in offshore companies should be used to settle Mrs Prest’s divorce claim.
The Court of Appeal stunned family lawyers at a previous hearing by ruling that the companies were separate legal entities and that London properties held by them could not be claimed by Mrs Prest.
That decision, which overturned an earlier ruling handing Mrs Prest a £17.5 million settlement, has led to predictions that other wealthy men could use similar tactics to deprive their former spouses of a fair payout. Opening today’s case, Richard Todd, QC, representing Mrs Prest, 50, warned that she would be left “destitute” and on benefits if she was denied the right to claim from the offshore companies controlled by her husband. He said that Mr Prest, 51, gives his wife £150 a week instead of the £270,000 a year required under a previous maintenance order and even though her husband had vast wealth illustrated by the fact that he was using his companies to pay fees of more than £100,000 a year to send the couple’s four children to some of the country’s “finest” private schools. Urging the seven Supreme Court judges to grant Mrs Prest access to her husband’s offshore wealth, he said the current situation was unfair and wrong.
“It is a cheats charter,” he told the court. “It would reduce the Matrimonial Causes Act to nothing more than a scarecrow.”
Earlier hearings were told that Mr Prest claimed to be worth about £48 million but Mrs Prest said he was worth “tens if not hundreds of millions” of pounds. The case continues.
