Rob Ford’s widow ordered to pay legal fees

Renata Ford, the widow of former Toronto mayor Rob Ford, has been ordered by a court to pay her lawyers nearly $300,000 in overdue legal fees.

In a brief judgment from April 16, Justice William Chalmers noted that Renata Ford had retained Aird & Berlis LLP in 2018 “in connection with the distribution of her late husband’s estate and the business and affairs of her late husband’s family business” and had agreed to pay the firm’s fees and disbursements.

“The Defendant did not pay the invoices despite request,” Chalmers writes.

The unpaid legal fees arise from Aird & Berlis LLP representing Renata Ford when she launched a lawsuit in 2018 against Premier Doug Ford, Randal Ford and the Ford family companies, according to the statement of claim.

In that lawsuit, Renata, on behalf of herself and her children, alleged Doug Ford, who was the trustee for Rob Ford’s estate, was to have divided up the inheritance between Renata and her two children, Douglas and Stephanie.

The suit alleged that Doug Ford had not done so and instead had reorganized the family businesses to his benefit and used the proceeds from the estate of Doug Sr. — the father of Rob, Randy and Doug — to keep the business afloat, thereby depriving Renata and her children of money by diminishing the value of Rob Ford’s estate.

This, the lawsuit said, “knowingly and deliberately put (Renata, Stephanie and Douglas) in a highly stressful and unfair financial position during their period of grief after Rob Ford’s death, and continued to do so for more than two years after Rob Ford’s death.”