Aaron Phypers accuses Denise Richards of Vicodin addiction, having ‘ongoing' affair in explosive letter
In an explosive letter to friends and family obtained by Page Six from Phypers, he claims Richards needs an 'intervention' for her alleged drug addiction that has affected their 14-year-old daughter, Eloise.
'For nearly a decade, she has struggled with an addiction to Vicodin (which she jokingly calls 'Vitamin D' or 'white chestnuts'), mixed with Adderall and tequila,' he claims.
'Some of you know this has been an issue for over 20 years. She's no longer eating real meals, and I've witnessed her pass out from substances – putting herself and others in danger, including while driving with our daughter.'
He also claims Richards has been involved in an affair, which he learned about earlier this year.
'She begged me not to leave, saying it was nothing and that she only loved me,' Phypers alleges in the letter.
'Then, she denied it all — even the explicit messages I found. Despite her promise to stop, more lies and shocking evidence emerged.'
Phypers further claims that she's the one who physically abused him on July 4 — their date of separation in his divorce filing.
'On July 4th, a simple act — ordering food for our daughter Eloise — led to an unthinkable discovery. Denise accused me of using her card, and in the confusion, my phone disappeared,' he claims.
'After searching for over 20 hours and being physically attacked when I asked for it back, I eventually found it smashed inside a trash bag, hidden beneath rotting garbage and litter. When I asked why, she denied it completely. That same night, she texted me saying she was filing for divorce.'
Phypers claims he and his parents have since been 'mistreated' after he filed for divorce first.
'I've experienced stalking (an AirTag placed on my car), been denied access to my personal belongings, and watched my elderly parents become frightened and mistreated — simply because they supported me and helped take care of Denise's animals, her daughter, and our home,' he claims in the letter.
'This isn't just a relationship breaking down. It's a cry for help,' he alleges, asking for prayers for Richards.
He also doubled down on his previous denial of Richards' allegations of abuse, claiming, 'I have never, ever physically harmed my wife, and I did not give her a black eye. I have only ever stepped in to protect her or others — including separating her from physically attacking her daughter — always coming from a place of care and concern.'
Page Six has reached out to Richards for comment but did not hear back.
Richards, 54, was granted a restraining order against Phypers, 52, last Wednesday.
In court documents obtained by Page Six, she shared photos of her bruised face, claiming Phypers had abused her.
'Throughout our relationship, Aaron would frequently violently choke me, violently squeeze my head with both hands, tightly squeeze my arms, violently slap me in my face and head, aggressively slam my head into the bathroom towel rack,' Richards alleged.
She claimed Phypers threatened to kill her and himself if she ever reported him to the cops.
She also referenced their big blowout fight on July 4, claiming he was the aggressor. Richards alleged he became 'enraged' after she told him that he and his family had to move out of their marital home.
'Over the course of nearly two hours, Aaron repeatedly got within two inches of my face and screamed at me degrading profanities, including calling me a 'c**t wh**e' and a 'piece of sh*t' and screaming at me, 'Nobody likes you',' she alleged in the court documents.
'Aaron repeatedly grabbed my left arm tightly in an aggressive manner. I told Aaron repeatedly that he needed to stay away from me and that he was going to hurt me.'
Phypers — who was previously caught on camera telling Richards he would 'crush' her hand in a resurfaced The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills scene — denied Richards' allegations shortly after the filing, calling them 'harmful and baseless'.
A source close to Phypers blamed the shocking picture of her black eye from her restraining order filing on her having an alleged 'alcohol problem'.
'That photo was taken in winter 2022, and the fact is she was drunk at the time and fell coming up the steps to Aaron's [since-closed medical] clinic, Q360,' the insider claimed to the Daily Mail.
Phypers filed for divorce from Richards earlier this month, listing 'irreconcilable differences' as the reason for their split.
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ABC News
3 hours ago
- ABC News
Victims of fraud and financial abuse caught in ATO's pursuit of $56b in tax debt
Laura remembers the day she decided to leave an abusive relationship. It was January 2020. She was on holiday with her former partner and recalls him getting physically violent in front of their children. "He hit me that day," Laura (not her real name) recalls. ABC News has had to conceal her identity to protect her safety. "After confronting him, he pushed me into the wall and then grabbed me by my throat … in front of the kids," she says. "He grabbed my phone, broke my phone … said he was going to kill me." If you need help immediately call emergency services on triple-0 Laura says the physical abuse was the breaking point, but she had suffered years of abuse and control. Her ex had a criminal record and was running a business under her name that had accumulated massive tax debts. But because Laura was unable to control the business or the financial accounts, she did not know the full extent of the debts. "Even though everything was in my name, I could not even transfer a dollar to myself," she says. "When we got separated, I remember having no roof over my head. "No bills were paid because he wouldn't pay any. He wouldn't allow me to buy groceries for me and the child. "He'd break the doors to [the house]. He kept saying to me, 'You'll never do it on your own. You'll never survive without me.'" When Laura did make the decision to leave and take over the business, her ordeal with the ATO began. She took control of the business in late 2021 for about a year, not realising the extent of the debts owed, and not realising the debt would balloon and she would eventually become personally liable for half a million dollars in debt. Laura is just one story among thousands of Australians experiencing financial hardship as the ATO chases almost $56 billion it says is owed by small businesses and individuals. If you have more information about this story please contact Nassim Khadem at or nassimkhadem@ The Tax Ombudsman and financial counsellors working with people like Laura want the ATO to use its discretion to take a more compassionate and understanding approach. And they want the federal government to change the law to give the ATO the ability to waive tax debts in these situations of financial abuse. They warn that when victims of financial abuse become liable for tax obligations, it can tip people over the edge, both mentally and financially. When the tax system is used to perpetrate financial abuse, the ATO has limited powers to clear a tax debt entirely or to transfer it to the perpetrator of the abuse. New ATO figures provided exclusively to ABC News show more than 65 per cent, or $36.6 billion, of the $55.9 billion in outstanding total debt is owed by small business, and the ATO says much of that is undisputed debt. But the issue is what happens in cases like Laura's, when the tax obligations were borne out of financial abuse. To recover the money owed, the ATO has ramped up its debt recovery action, and this action is sometimes used against women, or in some cases men, whose debt is tied to their ex-partners. The ATO's own data shows it is hitting people more often with a Director Penalty Notice that makes them personally liable for tax debts. It is also returning to using garnishee notices after a drop-off during the pandemic. These notices give the agency the authority to take money directly from people's bank accounts. It is also reporting alleged business debts to credit agencies, which then make it impossible for people to get access to credit. 38,409 Ann Kayis-Kumar, founding director of UNSW Tax and Business Advisory Clinic, deals with victim-survivors of financial abuse. She says Director Penalty Notices (DPN's) can be an effective way of collecting tax debt, "but what we're concerned about is that … this is unwittingly capturing people, survivors of abuse, and there are not appropriate safeguards in place". "We think that the reason for the DPN numbers being as high as they are is because they are in effect sexually transmitted tax debts," she says. Australian Bureau of Statistics data shows that 1 in 6 women and 1 in 13 men have experienced economic abuse by an intimate partner. "This is over 2.4 million Australians experiencing abuse. It's almost inevitable that a component of those … DPNs will be sweeping up this cohort of people," Ms Kayis-Kumar says. "We have clients come to us in tears sharing that their abusive former partner has said, 'I'm going to financially ruin you'. She says there needs to be a national investment in greater support for victims of abuse, "otherwise people will be playing a postcode lottery and falling through the cracks". "It's quite shocking, for example, that there is only one statewide financial abuse specialist [within the ATO]," she says. A question often asked of people who have faced financial abuse is why they did not make the decision to come forward sooner. This question, according to experts who work with survivors of domestic and family violence, fails to understand the premise of coercive control. "We need to see that culture change within the ATO," says Julie Dal Pra, a financial counsellor at EACH. She says the ATO must stop treating victims of financial abuse as tax avoiders. "These women are not trying to avoid tax or [be] scammers — it's simply not their tax obligations," she says. Ms Dal Pra says they are seeing more cases of women being made a director by their ex-partner without consent, and then becoming liable for the company's tax debts. "People's tax file numbers are being used fraudulently, and they are having earnings reported to the ATO that are not theirs," she says. "And I don't think there's a foundational knowledge of what financial abuse is and what it looks like. So when women are telling their stories to the ATO, they're not being listened to or believed." This is the ordeal Laura faced. In 2017, before Laura's business debt had ballooned because of general interest charges, there was one phone call that Laura's ex-partner made her do with the ATO. He wanted Laura to negotiate a payment arrangement with the ATO for the company's then-outstanding debt. "He was there, and he was prompting me on what to say," Laura recalls. This debt was growing by the day, accumulating general interest charges. It wasn't until February 2022 that Laura next contacted the ATO and revealed what had really happened. The ATO sent Laura a letter in September 2022, rejecting her request to have the tax debt waived, and arguing that in 2017, she should have explained what was going on. It says the 2017 phone conversation "shows that you were involved in the business operations. Therefore, you would have known about the company financial difficulties since then". It tells Laura, "a prudent director would have ensured that all reasonable steps to cause the company to either meet its obligation to pay, or have an administrator appointed, or begin to be wound up, be taken promptly". "A reasonable step could have been seeking advice from the ATO and ASIC and inform the relevant authorities that you were coerced into becoming the director of the company at an earlier point in time ie back in 2017," the letter stated. "In light of the above, the Commissioner is not satisfied that you are not liable for the Director Penalty liability under this defence." Laura says she did not come forward earlier because she was frightened and trapped under her ex's control. Laura breaks down several times while talking to the ABC, crying uncontrollably and struggling to speak. "I thought the verbal put-downs — 'You're fat, you're dumb, you're stupid. I'm going to [kill you] dig you up, pour concrete over you and no one will find you' — I thought that was normal. I didn't know any better. "He wouldn't let me see my family, and if I did, it was secret. It got worse when I had our child, he would keep tabs on me. He would call me 50 times a day … I was so scared." She says it was only in hindsight that she understood what was happening was financial abuse. "I wish that they [the ATO] would look at us as victims and see what we went through," she says. "The person that is liable — they should be going after them … I'll never be able to buy a house for my child. "I did everything they asked for and I still have to pay for such a large debt — that never came from my hands." She says while the ATO gave her contact numbers for lawyers following the 2022 conversation, she could not afford to pay lawyers and instead contacted free support services. She says the ATO has at no point informed her she could have stood down as director and relinquished the debt. In April 2023, Laura received a Director Penalty Notice — saying she had 21 days to repay the total debt, which at that stage had hit about half a million dollars — or she would be held personally liable. She says she then contacted a liquidator to start the process of winding up the business. Since then, the liquidator has sold off the business but Laura remains personally liable for about $200,000. Even when financial abuse survivors can afford lawyers, they must spend years fighting through the courts. "It consumed me going to court, consumed me," says Rose (also not her real name to protect her safety). "It affected my health. It affected the way I was a mother to my son." Rose left her husband after years of abuse. "During the marriage, there was alcohol abuse on his part, a lot of alcohol abuse, and with the alcohol came emotional and mental abuse," she recalled. "It was nine years into the marriage that I made the decision that I couldn't do it anymore. It was in 2020, and it was after a very bad drunken weekend from him." Rose says when she decided to leave him, he emptied their joint business bank account and then she had to spend years dealing with a tax debt he created. "For the first couple of months, he spent outrageously and then it was probably 2–3 months into separation that he just emptied them [the business accounts]," she said. "That money was supposed to be for [paying] our BAS [Business Activity Statements], superannuation, things like that, and he just completely drained them. "We're talking about $70,000, and then he was stopping future earnings going into the account." She said her ex-husband felt like he was losing control, and this was his way to control her. "I contacted my solicitor. There was one night, where $10,000 disappeared in one go and he [the solicitor] said OK, we need to take [legal] action." She said because she was a co-director of the business, the ATO came after her. Rose says in 2021, the ATO called her saying the business owed its staff superannuation that needed to be paid immediately. "These phone calls [from the ATO] went on for days and weeks, almost daily." "I said to them, you know, he [her ex] is also director. Are you contacting him? And they said to me that 'the men never pay, and the women do, so we always go after the women'. Rose says she paid staff superannuation out of her limited wages. But as time went on, more interest on the primary debt was charged and it ended up hitting about $200,000. She says during that time, she and her ex were in and out of court regularly and she was forced to get intervention orders — "there was bad behaviour from my ex … And in the end, the judge ordered that the business be sold." When the business was sold, the creditors, including the ATO, were paid. Rose says that when it comes to victims of financial abuse, the ATO must "be more compassionate" and "investigate further into situations like that rather than just chase" victims. "They were threatening me with jail, and I was just a tiny, tiny little person. I felt like I was maybe an easy target for them," she says. The ATO is currently undergoing consultation on a new ATO Vulnerability Framework, which it says seeks to "carefully differentiate those taxpayers who may be experiencing vulnerability" and look at ways the agency can offer them "tailored support". It says this framework "may include victims of financial abuse" but does not confirm that will be the case. Tax Ombudsman Ruth Owen recently undertook a review into financial abuse within the tax system. "Personally, I found it really shocking — the amount of coercive control and economic abuse within the Australian community," Ms Owen says. "It's really the responsibility of parliament to consider whether legislation needs to change in these instances. She says while legislative changes could give people an opportunity to clear the debt, the other problem that can be addressed more immediately is for the ATO to have more specialised staff who can recognise the warning signs of abuse. "The ATO has a responsibility to recognise there are people out there who have tax debts for which they are not responsible," the Tax Ombudsman says. She calls on the ATO to set up specialist teams to recognise these particular types of cases. "It's very, very difficult to identify cases of financial abuse victims, survivors of financial abuse quite often won't report," she says. Ms Kayis Kumar says in the United States, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has legal provisions that recognise victims of domestic violence are deserving of special protection. She says the US has had some form of "innocent spouse relief" in place since 1971, providing relief for spouses who are jointly liable for tax debts. And she says following legislative reform of the US provisions in 1998, the IRS has, in recent years, been recognising that survivors of economic abuse may deserve relief from tax debts. She says while this provision may not be directly translatable given differences between the Australian and the US filing systems, there is much to learn from the US system for the Australian context. While legal changes are being contemplated, Laura wants to see immediate action. She wants the ATO to employ staff who are specialised in domestic and family violence and take a more understanding approach. "It's not easy coming out. It's not easy telling someone that you were abused in many different ways," she says in tears. Laura says the ATO is now investigating her case and reviewing information from the liquidator that she was not involved with running the business when the debt was incurred. "I don't have the means, the funds, to pay that debt," she says. "I'm hoping they acknowledge what has happened and that the debt is removed from my name."
Daily Telegraph
13 hours ago
- Daily Telegraph
What NYC shooting means for Australian contact sport's future
Don't miss out on the headlines from Other Sports. Followed categories will be added to My News. The horrific New York City shooting has sparked concerns about the ramifications in Australia, particularly across some of the country's most prolific sporting codes. Details emerging after gunmen Shane Devon Tamura killed four people in an NYC office, before turning the gun on himself, revealed his likely intended target was the offices of the National Football League. The NFL's offices were in the same building but weren't accessible through the elevator Tamura mistakenly used. A note left by the shooter revealed he blamed playing American football (which he played in his youth) for his supposed struggle with chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a neurological disease plaguing many Australian athletes in contact sports. 'Football gave me CTE and it cause me to drink a gallon of antifreeze. You can't go against the NFL. They'll squash you,' Tamura wrote in a in a three-page note found in his wallet. 'Please study brain for CTE. I'm sorry. The league knowingly concealed the dangers to our brains to maximise profits. 'They failed us.' This image from surveillance video obtained by The Associated Press shows Shane Tamura outside a Manhattan office building on Monday, July 28, 2025 in New York. Photo: AP Photo. After his shooting spree, Tamura shot himself in the chest, suspected to be in a bid to avoid his brain in hopes of it being studied. Despite suspecting he had CTE, the condition can only be diagnosed definitively after death. The brain disorder is a form of dementia and occurs typically from repeated concussions and head trauma during a sporting career. Fans of Australian sport will be all too familiar with CTE and the long term impact of athlete concussion, including suicide. Rugby league great and premiership winning coach Paul Green tragically took his own life in 2022, a post mortem analysis revealing he had a severe form of CTE. Across codes, AFL legends Danny Frawley and Shane Tuck had the same diagnosis after their suicides in 2019 and 2020. Tamura played football in high school and in his suicide note blamed the NFL for his suspected CTE condition. Photo: Las Vegas Dept. Motor Vehicle via AP. The NRL community lost former player and coach Paul Green after he committed suicide, with a post-mortem later revealing he had suffered from CTE. Photo:. With the sports bringing in new measures in recent years in hopes of stamping out blunt contact to the head, there are major concerns about the impact of the disease on players given it cannot be diagnosed until it is too late. While yet to be diagnosed, the NYC shooters claims of CTE paint a scary portrait for an affliction Australia's sport is starting to learn much more about. Sports Medicine Australia CEO Jamie Crain warned a lack of understanding around the risks of concussion in professional and community sport in Australia could pose serious long term health issues if not managed properly. But the expert believes this country 'does quite well' dealing with minimising concussion, but after the events in the US, admits people will be on alert to CTE and the possible effects. The priority instead of trying to completely eradicate concussions should be to manage them when they happen. 'Because it will happen, it's just an inherent part of contact sport, certainly with football and rugby and those types of sports,' he said. Danny Frawley took his own life in 2019, after which it was determined he suffered from CTE. Photo: Supplied. Richmond player Shane Tuck suffered from the same condition before suicide in 2020. Photo:. While Crain believes rules may need to be tweaked, the challenge is striking a balance, not becoming so alarmed that parents take their kids out of playing contact sport, as that poses its own issues. 'We might then indirectly encourage a sedentary lifestyle and that brings itself a lot of potential long term health issues. 'There could inevitably be some rule changes that do need to take place within those particular sports to minimise the risk. I think that we won't be able to eradicate it. 'But we do need to manage it and then when concussion does happen, we look after those players in the best possible way.' Originally published as Chilling warning for Australia in wake of New York City bloodbath
News.com.au
2 days ago
- News.com.au
Five dead including gunman in New York office shooting spree
Four people including a police officer were killed Monday after a gunman walked into a skyscraper in central Manhattan and opened fire in broad daylight, officials said. A fifth victim was also in critical condition after being shot, while the gunman apparently took his own life, Mayor Eric Adams told a late-night briefing at a hospital near the scene of the shooting. The gunman was caught on camera exiting a black BMW carrying an M-4 rifle, then entering the building, immediately opening fire on a police officer before "spraying the lobby" with bullets, police commissioner Jessica Tisch told the press conference. He then took an elevator to the 33rd floor, of Rudin Management which owns the building, where the man continued his spree before apparently shooting himself. He was later discovered by officers next to his weapon. The office tower block at 345 Park Avenue is also home to hedge fund giant Blackstone, auditor KPMG and the National Football League. Tisch told the briefing that the suspect was believed to have acted alone but inquiries were ongoing, with the FBI assisting in the investigation. She identified the shooter as Shane Tamura of Las Vegas and said a revolver, ammunition and magazines were found in his vehicle along with medication bearing his name. The man had a history of mental health issues according to Las Vegas law enforcement -- but did appear to possess a valid firearms permit for Nevada, Tisch said. He drove cross-country from the southwestern state in recent days and arrived in New York on Monday, she said. The incident began around 6:00 pm (2200 GMT) when reports of gunfire prompted hundreds of police to swarm a busy office district on the storied Park Avenue, an area popular with tourists and visiting businesspeople. A worker from a nearby office building wept as she left the area after a local lockdown was lifted, while another described a gunman going floor to floor as staff prepared to leave for the day. Adams said the fallen police officer, an immigrant from Bangladesh who was 36 years old, was among the dead. Two other males and a female died, and another man remained in a critical condition, officials said without giving any preliminary motive for the shootings. - Rush hour - Office worker Shad Sakib told AFP that he was packing his things to leave work when a public address announcement warned him and his colleagues to shelter in place. "Everyone was confused with like, 'wait, what's going on?' And then someone finally realized that it's online, that someone walked in with a machine gun," said the witness who wore a grey suit jacket. "He walked right into a building right next door. We saw the photo of him walking through the same area that I walked through to get lunch here. "You would think it won't happen to you, and then it does." Mass shootings are common in the United States, where a constitutional right to bear arms outweighs demands for stricter rules. There have been 254 mass shootings in the United States this year including Monday's incident in New York, according to the Gun Violence Archive -- which defines a mass shooting as four or more people shot. Police officers deployed a drone near Park Avenue at the height of the evening rush-hour as dozens of officers swarmed the area, some carrying long guns and others wearing ballistic vests. The area is home to several five-star business hotels, as well as a number of corporate headquarters. The United Nations headquarters is nearby. New York Governor Kathy Hochul said she has been briefed on the shooting. The frontrunner in the race for mayor Zohran Mamdani wrote on X that he was "heartbroken to learn of the horrific shooting in midtown and I am holding the victims, their families, and the NYPD officer... in my thoughts."
