Legal News

Deadbeat dad or greedy kids?

By Glen Ashman

Jury: No back child support for billionaire's kids

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? A jury on Thursday rejected a claim by billionaire real estate mogul Donald Bren's two adult children for $134 million in retroactive child support.  The unusual case was a high-stakes contest between one of the nation's richest men and the children he fathered during a 13-year affair with Jennifer McKay Gold, who brought the lawsuit on behalf of her children when they were minors.  Christie Bren, 22, and her brother, David Bren, 18, pursued the case when they became adults.  Jurors deliberated two hours before siding with the 78-year-old Irvine Co. chairman, whose attorney argued that no family court would have given the children more than the millions he already paid.  Gold, who signed agreements with Donald Bren when the children were born, said they were cheated of the support to which they were entitled.  The suit sought $400,000 a month for each of the children in retroactive support from 1988 to 2002. Their mother testified she received a total of about $3 million for them during that period.  Four contracts were created involving child support each time Gold became pregnant and after the children were born. The accords, beginning in 1988, rose from $3,500 a month to $18,000 a month between 1992 and 2002.

Full post as published by It's (Barely) Legal on August 26, 2010 (boomark / email).