Tatiana, the ex-wife of a Russian oil tycoon, took £450 million in alimony from her ex-husband's pocket with the help of a lawyer who has the title of "the world's most expensive female lawyer". This divorce case, which was once considered the most expensive in the world, has recently made new developments.
In January, Tatiana took a female lawyer to court. The reason turned out to be that the other party did not help her get a yacht worth 200 million pounds in her ex-husband's name??!!
Born in Azerbaijan in 1954, her ex-husband Fahad fled to Russia from his hometown at the age of 15.
In the 80s, after making his first pot of gold in the fur business, Farhad had the vision to invest all his family assets in the natural gas industry, and became rich in one fell swoop, becoming a well-known figure in the local business and political circles.
In the 90s, Tatiana, the daughter of a 17-year-old Russian Air Force general, met her ex-husband, who was 18 years older than herself. After four years of dating, the two registered their marriage in Moscow, and Tatiana gave birth to two sons a few years after marriage.
Subsequently, Tatiana, like many Russian oligarchs, immigrated to the UK with a large number of assets and two children. While she is raising children in the UK, she rarely asks about her ex-husband who is based in Russia.
Around 2000, the relationship between the two broke down, and the ex-husband preemptively claimed that Tatiana was cheating and filed for divorce in Russia. But afterwards, some media broke out that it was actually Farhad who had a mistress and secretly gave birth to 3 illegitimate children.
All in all, in addition to living in the UK with her two minor biological sons at that time, Tatiana also helped raise another son he had with his ex-wife.
For this reason, she could only dismiss the divorce lawsuit many times on the grounds that both parties still have feelings. The two lived a long distance like this, and their lives were peaceful.
In 2012, the ex-husband's value skyrocketed after selling the company. Tatiana also did not want to endure a marriage in name only at this time, and filed for divorce in the UK and proposed a maintenance plan.
In order not to pay alimony, the ex-husband racked his brains, first forged the proof of the divorce agreement between the two in Russia in 2000, and argued that the money was earned by him before marriage and had nothing to do with Tatiana.
However, the British court did not accept his claim, and in 2016, the ex-husband sentenced her ex-husband to Tatiana 453 million pounds (about 3.94 billion RMB) for "falsifying the divorce certificate in an attempt to escape paying alimony", which accounted for 41.5% of the couple's marital property.
However, this divorce battle has only passed half of the progress bar at this moment.
After the divorce judgment in 2016, the ex-husband has been refusing to enforce the payment for many years. Therefore, Tatiana, who only got a house in the UK and a $5.7 million (about 41 million RMB) helicopter, was unwilling to sit idly by and decided to take the initiative to go to court to ask for money.
Because her husband lived abroad for a long time and did not want to return to the UK, she complained that she could not find herself to come in person. In 2021, Tatiana invited Fiona, the world's most expensive divorce lawyer, to sue her eldest son for helping her ex-husband transfer the joint assets of the husband and wife.
This was done because the eldest son had followed him to British citizenship, lived in the UK and was highly dependent on his father's financial support. Sending him to the dock is equivalent to opening a breakthrough in his ex-husband's pocket.
The female lawyer Tatiana hired was not an ordinary divorce lawyer.
In the 90s of the last century, Fiona helped Prince Andrew win the divorce lawsuit. Later, she represented Charles in the divorce, and asked Princess Diana to voluntarily give up the title of "His Royal Highness" that she had always been unwilling to lose in the divorce case, and only took away 17 million pounds.
She is known as the royal counsel for divorce cases and was awarded the title of baroness by Queen Elizabeth.
In addition to the royal family, there is a lot of news that she is a ruthless character in court.
For example, in the divorce case of Beatles member Paul McCartney, the ex-wife who proposed 125 million pounds (1.13 billion RMB) in alimony only received 24.3 million pounds (about 220 million RMB). The woman was so angry that she poured a glass of water on her head in the courtroom.
In addition, between 2019 and 2022, the most expensive divorce case in history involving 554 million pounds (about 4.9 billion RMB) in alimony between Princess Haya of Jordan and the sheikh of Dubai was also won by Fiona.
Fiona, who has made great achievements, is rumored to have a consulting fee of as high as 600 pounds per hour more than ten years ago, so the oligarch's ex-wife Tatiana invited her to come, naturally in order to win a battle.
Sure enough, in 2020, at Fiona's suggestion, Tatiana applied to the court to search her eldest son's house, and found a series of evidence in it that the father and son conspired to get her out of the house. It also includes a phone recording in which her ex-husband said that he would not leave Tatiana even if he burned all the money, and the eldest son calling her a "slut".
In April 2021, the court finally ruled that the eldest son had helped his father hide his property and demanded that he pay 75 million pounds (about 680 million RMB) to his mother.
In July of that year, the couple reached a new agreement, with the man giving the woman £100 million in cash and £50 million worth of art.
Although she finally got a certain amount of alimony, the verdict seems to be a cool ending for Tatiana. But in fact, from the time the divorce case took effect in 2016 to 2021, she suffered a lot of losses.
In order to win the case, Tatiana had to apply for a huge loan from the fund company to pay a team of lawyers and experts, including Fiona. These expenses will not be paid off until alimony is received.
Tatiana said Fiona had promised to get 600 million pounds (about 5.32 billion RMB) in alimony for her, but the judge ultimately awarded "only" 450 million pounds.
It is estimated that while winning the lawsuit against her eldest son in 2021 and getting 100 million in cash + 50 million artworks, Tatiana needs to pay 74.6 million pounds in legal fees to the borrower. Such a fee is indeed high.
In January 2024, Tatiana sued Fiona for negligence in the divorce lawsuit, claiming in part that she did not get a yacht named Luna in her ex-husband's name.
The 10-storey yacht was bought by Tatiana's ex-husband from former Chelsea club owner Roman Abramovich. The yacht has two helipads, a swimming pool and a mini-submarine worth more than £200 million (about 1.8 billion RMB).
In a report on April 29, 2024, the lawyer said that when Titayana commissioned, she only emphasized that she wanted cash artwork on her ex-husband's ship, and was not interested in the yacht itself.
Moreover, during the lawsuit, the ex-husband's girlfriend was waiting to give birth on the yacht, and Tatiana said at the time that if she insisted on the yacht, she was afraid that the conflict between the two parties would be intensified, and the alimony would be even more difficult to get.
The lawyer also broke the news that Tatiana grinds and chirps every time she pays the lawyer's fee, making it difficult for them to progress their work. Moreover, the 600 million alimony she proposed by herself has no legal basis, and cannot be used as evidence to determine that the lawyer's team's litigation is not up to standard.
As of press time, Tatiana's case against the lawyers' group is still in the process of adducing evidence against each other, and it is believed that it will not be completed for a while.
After reading the reversals of this sky-high divorce case, netizens who ate melons couldn't help but stand up and express their opinions:
"When your ex-husband started looking for a young model to be his little girlfriend, you got $450 million in alimony, and now you use that money to sue your lawyer, which may be more expensive than you buy a yacht!"
"The cost of maintaining and repairing a yacht can quickly empty out alimony, and you have to learn to let go of your obsessions. ”
"She can obviously use alimony to earn interest, and then buy the same yacht, absolutely not. ”
Some netizens feel quite understanding of her:
"She's going to get poor by hiring a new expensive lawyer to sue her old lawyer..."
"I still kind of agree with her...
Her lawyer had previously collected £70 million for the princess of Jordan in a divorce lawsuit, and when I heard it, I thought this lawyer was simply a monopoly overlord.
The divorce lawyer's fee of 70 million is too difficult to evaluate, and these people who are proficient in the law can help win the lawsuit, which does not mean that the parties can get the money. This means that the client wins "literal money", but in fact does not receive it, and has to pay the lawyer a high salary. ”
"Just looking at the news, I understand that the wife won, but the husband won't give the money, so she tracked down where the yacht was and asked the lawyer to keep the boat under control.
The lawyer didn't do that, so she sued the lawyer for wasting her time and resources. Doesn't it look like anything?"
This sky-high divorce case, which has lasted for more than 10 years, really has a big reversal every year, and you can never guess what will be played in the next episode.
As for the progress of the showdown between Tatiana and lawyer Fiona, such an expensive divorce melon, let's wait and see~