Divorced man awarded only 0.5 per cent of wife's $80million fortune wins 'gender bias' appeal

Daily Mail​

2 days ago

A city trader who claimed his divorce settlement was 'gender prejudice' after being handed $450K of his ex-wife's $80million family fortune has won an appeal case to have the arrangement reviewed.
Simon Entwistle's three-year marriage to Jenny Helliwell ended in 2022 but he was awarded just 0.5 per cent of her fortune. He blamed gender bias for the decision and has won his case at the Court of Appeal in London, meaning his settlement will now be considered again.
Appeal judges ruled Jenny had engaged in 'fraudulent' behavior by not declaring almost $64milllion of her £personal fortune whilst making a prenuptial agreement.
The couple had a lavish wedding in Paris in August 2019 and Entwistle 'enjoyed the trappings of being married into a family of exceptional wealth,' it was said.
They were living in a luxury villa in Dubai gifted to Helliwell by her father, businessman Neil Helliwell. But when they split up, Helliwell got her lawyers to order her husband out of the family home with just 48 hours' notice in August 2022.
The pair, both 42, then went to court, with Entwistle asking for $3.3million from his interior designer ex-wife's personal fortune.
Entwistle claimed he needed $48K a year for flights and $35K a year 'on a meal plan just for himself' because he said: 'I can't even cook an omelet.
The judge told him: 'Being married to a rich person for three years does not suddenly catapult you into a right to live like that after the relationship has ended.'
He was left with a 0.5 per cent share of the pot after the judge upheld a pre-nuptial agreement the pair had signed promising they would each keep their own assets in the event of a split.
Appealing that ruling, Entwistle said he was a victim of 'gender prejudice' and that the prenup had been invalidated by Helliwell having failed to disclose assets worth almost $64milllion- amounting to 73 per cent of her wealth.
Now, Lady Justice King has ruled that the nondisclosure by the heiress amounted to 'fraudulent' behavior which had invalidated the prenup. She allowed Entwistle's appeal and sent the case back to the divorce courts, ordering it to be recalculated as if the pre-nuptial agreement did not exist.
The judge said: 'Willful or fraudulent breach of that agreement such that the disclosure made bears no resemblance to the true wealth of a party...is capable of being material non-disclosure, as it deprives the other party of the information that they have agreed is necessary in order for them to decide whether to agree to a pre-nuptial agreement.
'Since the husband in the instant case was deliberately deprived of information which it had been agreed that he should have, in my judgment, the agreement cannot stand.'
Challenging the judge's ruling at the Court of Appeal, Deborah Bangay KC, for Mr Entwistle, said: 'The judge was warned against gender prejudice, but failed to heed that warning.
'Had the positions been reversed, it is very unlikely that he would have so ungenerously assessed the needs of a wife after a six-year relationship.'
She also argued that the prenup, which had been key to the husband's low award, was invalidated by Helliwell's failure to disclose her full wealth.
Lady Justice King, giving her ruling, made no finding on the gender prejudice argument but said: 'The husband and wife entered into the agreement on the day they married, July 12, 2019. Upon divorce, each party would retain their own separate property and split any jointly owned property as to 50 per cent each.
'At the heart of the dispute is whether the wife's undoubted failure to disclose the majority of her substantial wealth should have the consequence that the agreement should not be upheld by the court.
'In the present case, the non-disclosure of the majority of her assets by the wife was undoubtedly deliberate.'