‘First Wives Club’ say courts stood by as their husbands hid assets
THEY are founder members of the First Wives Club – divorcees who say they were left with “next to nothing” by their husbands after they refused to fully disclose the true extent of their wealth in the divorce courts.
Now Michelle Young, who was locked in a bitter and protracted legal battle with her former husband Scot Young, is seeking perjury charges against three of his associates who she claims lied in court about his assets, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt.
She claims to have evidence that they lied about their knowledge and involvement in his various business interests, properties and trusts before his death in December 2014 after he fell from the window of his fourth-floor apartment. Another member of the socalled club, Vivien Hobbs, a businesswoman, is demanding that the CPS bring charges against her former husband, who is a naval architect and exCEO of public companies, whom she has accused of aggressively refusing to fully disclose his assets.
The women, who are both being represented by the same heavyweight legal team that includes Imran Khan QC, argue that judges in the family courts know that tycoons routinely lie about their wealth but allow it to happen as they are so obsessed with “driving cases through at the rate of knots”, creating “an unholy mess of injustice”.
They gave statements to the Met Police but officers declined to investigate.
Determined to take a stand against what they believe is a lack of adherence to the law in the family courts, they have written to Alison Saunders, the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), urging her to review the evidence and take action to send a message that the failure to disclose assets in the divorce courts will not be tolerated.
Ms Young has spent years fighting for
Judges are so obsessed with ‘driving cases through at the rate of knots’ creating ‘an unholy mess of injustice’
access to what she insists are her late husband’s missing millions. She believes he concealed up to £300million and hid the assets in a complex web of offshore accounts and companies.
Mr Young claimed to have lost his entire fortune when a vast property deal in Russia, known as Project Moscow, collapsed in 2006, leaving him with debts of £30million.
In 2013, Mr Young was jailed for contempt of court for refusing to disclose details of his complex finances. His exwife was eventually awarded £20million but has yet to receive a penny.
In her statement to police, Ms Young accuses her former husband’s associates of providing false evidence to support a conspiracy to defraud by insisting they had no business links with him and concealing his assets, which she says has had a “devastating” effect on her and her two daughters.
One of them gave a statement insisting that he had never been involved in any joint business venture with Mr Young, who had no legal or beneficial interest in a specific London property.
However, Ms Young claims to have evidence that Mr Young retained an interest in the property until his death after which it was “silently removed”.
Ms Young claims she was “just a pawn in a twisted game of chess” and is determined to see those she alleges lied on her husband’s behalf face justice.
When approached for comment, Ms Young’s spokesman confirmed that both woman had taken their perjury complaint to the DPP after the police had failed to pursue it.