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Wealthy ex-wife to pay £5m after losing appeal
Wed 24 Feb 2010
A wealthy heiress has lost an appeal against the revision of her divorce settlement, which means she has to pay her ex-husband £5 million.
Peter Marano and Elena Bowes Marano split up three years ago and a court ruled that their £18.8 million worth of assets be divided equally.
However, the subsequent property slump led to the equity in Mr Marano's office properties plummeting from £88 million to £10 million.
Divorce judge Mrs Justice King therefore ordered Mrs Marano, heir to her father's hula hoop and Frisbee company, to pay him £5 million to cover some of the losses.
Mrs Marano opted to launch an appeal in July 2009 but this has now been rejected by Lord Justice Thorpe, who said her estranged husband's fortune could not be restored with expertise and business acumen.
The judge decided that since he was at the mercy of market forces, Mr Marano was eligible to receive a payment from his ex-wife.
Jacqueline Major, a solicitor at Winckworth Sherwood Solicitors, commented: "This is another 'Big Money' case arising from the ravages of the recession.
"Divorce lawyers have been saying for a long time that the 'yardstick of equality' applies to both men and women equally.
"This appeal decision demonstrates this – at the time of the trial before the judge the value of Mr Marano's assets had been severely affected by the recession, so applying the yardstick of equality to the assets meant Mrs Marano had to pay him £5 million.
"She appealed but the Court of Appeal upheld the judge's decision, as to ensure equality her payment was necessary.
"The problem the judge faced was that at the time of trial and for the foreseeable future his properties were worth a lot less than before.
"Virtually everyone has seen the effect of the economic climate bite in some way on their personal and business assets – be it from job loss, lack of bonuses, or a decrease in the values of investments, properties, pensions etc.
"For anyone getting divorced or separated, proper advice is vital, and the structuring of agreements becomes much more intricate to try to achieve fairness, yet at the same time take into account changing asset values.
"We often use financial advisors and other experts to help with 'projections' of values of assets, so that when negotiating an agreement, the current values and their forecast can be as clear as possible in such an uncertain climate."
