Scots oil boss’s Russian wife in £2k watch ‘spree’
The woman spent more than £2,000 on watches at Heathrow Airport after she and her husband fought at a London hotel, said a judge.
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Hide AdDeputy High Court Judge Jennifer Roberts said there had been “some violence on both sides” during the row and the man had been led from the hotel in handcuffs by police.
“As far as the husband was concerned, that event clearly marked the final end of the marriage, and he communicated the same to the wife,” said Judge Roberts.
“She felt sufficiently angry and aggrieved to spend over £2,000 on the purchase of watches at the duty free shopping area of Heathrow as she made her way home to Moscow later that day.”
Detail has emerged in a written analysis of the case by the judge following a hearing in the Family Division of the High Court in London.
The couple had divorced and were fighting over money.
Judge Roberts said she had been asked to made various “findings of fact”. More hearings are due.
The man was 62 and had been an oil and gas industry boss who had worked in the UK, the US and Russia, said the judge. The woman was 48 and had been a company administrator in Moscow. They were not named.
The judge concluded that the man “deliberately misled” the court, the woman and his lawyers about the “true state of his finances”.
She said the woman’s integrity had been impugned in relation to “dealings with a portfolio of matrimonial properties”.
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Hide AdJudge Roberts said the couple had liquid assets of about £4 million and had run up nearly £1 million in lawyers’ fees.
She said the litigation had been a “financial disaster” for the couple, who had been married for more than 10 years and had three daughters.