How Koo discovered her ‘fiance’ was already engaged...
She opened an envelope and out fell another woman’s ring
KOO STARK’S romance with Prince Andrew ended after it was revealed she had starred in a mildly erotic film.
But the actress’s relationship with American financier Warren Walker came to an even more disastrous finish, court documents disclose. The details have been made public because Koo is suing Walker for £200,000 at the High Court.
Koo, 62, was engaged to Walker, 59, she reveals in the writ, but was devastated to discover he had cheated on her with another woman.
He was even engaged to both at the same time. Koo discovered his infidelity when she opened an envelope containing an engagement ring returned to him by the other lady.
Koo was so devastated she broke off her engagement. However, the couple got back together after Walker, with whom she has a daughter, Tatiana, 21, arranged a church wedding. Forbes publishing heir Walker later called off the wedding, but promised to provide financially for Koo and their daughter, as long as she dropped plans to write a newspaper column, says the writ.
After she lost a previous court case against Walker, Koo was made bankrupt and even faced criminal charges over a painting Walker claimed she had stolen from him. However, she was acquitted.
This latest case led to a private hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice last week.
Koo broke up with Prince Andrew in 1983. She married raffish manabout-town Tim Jefferies, 56, the next year, but they divorced in 1990.
She met Walker in 1994, but was not interested in him initially, as she had a wide circle of friends and wanted to have a serious relationship, marry, and have children.
Walker told her he was oldfashioned, also wanted to marry and have children, and provide for them. He followed her to Mongolia to see the Dalai Lama and proposed to her, according to the writ.
The couple planned to wed in 1996, and hoped to have children, but Koo claims Walker did not love her, had no real intention of marrying and was ‘just stringing her along’.
She discovered she was pregnant and gave birth in 1997 to Tatiana, whose godfather is Prince Andrew.
Koo says that, after reaching a deal with Walker, she turned down lucran
tive opportunities, including a newspaper column and £500,000 from oK! magazine for photos of Tatiana’s christening party — an agreement sanctioned by Prince Andrew.
Walker claimed he would pay her at least £50,000 a year and buy her a London home if she dropped her plans, which she did, the writ claims.
Koo accuses him of lying in court in the U.S., and when confronted, he allegedly replied: ‘So I lied. So what?’
Koo reached a settlement with Walker in 2001, in which he agreed to pay her £200,000, she says. Now, she is turning to the High Court to enforce this, and seeking interest.
She is also seeking legal declarations that he will pay her £50,000 a year, as well as rent, household expenses, and the cost of food, a nanny, and a cleaner since 1999, adjusted for inflation.
Walker denies almost everything. In court documents, he says he was recently divorced when they met and never told Koo he wanted to remarry or have children. He claims she told him she was unable to have children and that, at the time of Tatiana’s birth, he ‘could not be certain that he was indeed the child’s father’.
Insisting they were never engaged or cohabited, Walker accuses Koo of perjury and says he had to use court proceedings to get Tatiana back after Koo took her to America.
He says that Mrs Justice Pauffley ordered in 2009 that Tatiana should live with him and that Koo should have only supervised contact. After a series of hearings, the Court of Appeal ordered him to provide a fund of £1.1million for housing Tatiana until July 2015.