WFTV anchor sued for divorce by husband
WFTV-Channel 9 anchor Martha Sugalski and her husband, businessman Robert Reich, provided an intimate look at their marriage when sharing their struggles to conceive, their pain at a miscarriage and their joy at the birth of triplets.
Now a contentious feud is unfolding six years after the children’s births. The marriage is “irretrievably broken,” Reich said in a July 10 petition suing for divorce.
The couple married May 30, 2009, in Winter Park, and she is one of the most highprofile figures in Central Florida media. She is also well paid, and Reich seeks temporary spousal support.
In a counter petition Monday, Sugalski seeks temporary and permanent alimony, says her husband forged her signature “to move and dispose of some of her retirement assets” and adds that she has “knowledge of one failed attempt of the Husband to take out a loan in her name.”
A July 24 motion from Reich’s lawyers reads: “Presently, the Husband makes approximately $96,000/year gross. Although the Wife has not yet filed her Financial Affidavit, the Husband estimates that she makes at least five times what he makes in income per year.”
His motion also states: “Despite requests for financial assistance with the marital home expenses, which are substantial, the Wife has refused to comply. The monthly mortgage, equity line, insurance, and tax payments alone are almost $7,000/month.”
The motion adds: “The Husband has a financial need and the Wife has an ability to pay.”
Reich puts the current value of their Longwood home at $1.5 million, court documents show.
In her Monday petition, Sugalski asks the court to determine how the couple’s assets should be distributed, including the marital home, a ranch and land in Montana and several businesses owned by Reich. “The Husband has incurred several known debts, including debt to the Internal Revenue Service, which should be determined to be the Husband’s sole debt,” the petition reads.
Sugalski asked the court “to seal the file in its entirety due to the public nature of her work and the possibility that these court proceedings might be utilized to tarnish her good name publicly,” an order from Circuit Judge Melanie Chase reads.
On Monday, Chase ordered that financial disclosures be sealed.
Reich says he and Sugalski continue to live in the same home with their young children.
Court documents reveal tensions between the couple. Reich’s motion says Sugalski “has removed the mass majority of photographs which have Husband in them from the marital home leaving vacant spaces on the walls” and “Wife has not disclosed the whereabouts of these items.”
It states: “Wife’s behaviors cause needless stress for the family and jeopardize the emotional well-being of the minor children who do not deserve to see a lack of respect of one parent by another in violation of the administrative order’s guidelines as to shared parenting.”
Reich seeks “replacement of the photographs to their proper place in the marital home.”
Sugalski has been a popular figure in Orlando TV for her savvy use of social media and her updates on the triplets: sons Heaton and Wilder and daughter Holden. In a 2013 interview, Sugalski called Reich “a great partner” in caring for the triplets.
Then they discussed the two-year struggle to have children. “The journey was filled with a lot of setbacks,” Reich said. “There were times when this may not have happened, ” he said, pointing to the babies.
Sugalski’s career moves have made news. She joined WESH-Channel 2 in 2006. She left the NBC affiliate in 2014, was off the air for a year, then jumped to ABC affiliate WFTV in 2015. She anchors at 5, 6 and 11 p.m. with Greg Warmoth.
Sugalski has three children — Chase, Maxwell and Spencer — from a previous marriage to sportscaster Craig Minervini. They divorced in 2005. Sugalski came to Orlando from WTVJ, the NBC station in South Florida.