Chesham divorcee's "profoundly unreliable" £1.6m claim (From Bucks Free Press)

Chesham divorcee's "profoundly unreliable" £1.6m claim

6:40pm Tuesday 11th November 2008 in

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A 61-YEAR-OLD woman has lost a court case against the legal team that won her a £1.4m divorce – and her evidence was branded “self-serving, evasive” and “knowingly untruthful”.

Carol Williams alleged her representatives did not tell her she could get more than double her £1.4m settlement because of forthcoming changes to the law when she divorced in 2000.

Yet the court found she sought a “quickie” divorce from husband of 22-years John Williams because she was living with her singing teacher – and feared her husband would find out.

Mr Justice Field told the High Court that “much” of her evidence about her relationship with singing teacher John Rogers was “untruthful”.

In his ruling he said: “Regrettably, I am obliged to record that I found Mrs Williams to be a profoundly unreliable witness.

“Her evidence was self-serving, evasive and, on occasion, knowingly untruthful."

She moved out of the £1.1m family home in Arrewig Lane, Chartridge, Chesham in April 1999, the court was told. The couple had four children.

Her August 2000 divorce settlement left her with £1.4m - but she later claimed Reading-based solicitors Thompson Leatherdale and barrister Nicholas Frances QC could have got her another £1.6m.

This was because a November 2000 House of Lords ruling meant women could claim for half their ex-husband’s wealth.

The 2000 settlement meant her ex-husband paid her legal bills and she got £1.3m, a £120,000 house in Delemere Road, Marlow and a LandRover.

Mr Justice Field threw out her claim that she would have waited for the outcome of the Lords’ ruling.

He said she was “very keen to get on with starting a new life and wanted her financial position to be finalised as quickly as reasonably possible”.

He said: “In her eyes, her husband was ruthless and she knew that, if she postponed the negotiations, he would be furious and likely to fight her every inch of the way, a prospect she was very anxious to avoid”.

And he said Mrs Williams had lied when claiming a reference to her “new partner” in a July 1999 letter was “referring to her singing partner, and not a sexual partner”.

It was not true she expressed “displeasure” with her divorce settlement when it was awarded he said – and he had “grave suspicions” that she forged a letter on the solicitors’ headed notepaper.

And she defied his instructions not to talk to anyone involved in the case while it was being heard by telephoning Mr Rogers, he said.

He added: “Such was the unreliability of Mrs Williams' evidence that I decline to accept any part of it unless it is corroborated by contemporaneous documents or by the evidence given by other factual witnesses.”

She was suffering “serious side effects” from two silicone implants when she left the family home, the court was told.

Mr Williams ran Luton-based Jencons (Scientific) Ltd, which has a £8m turnover and was worth more than £4m, the court was told.

Of the cash Mrs Williams was given £1.3m has since been “lost” in homes bought to buy-to-let but since repossessed.

She had told the court: “I didn't know there was a case in the House of Lords, otherwise I would have waited...I knew I should have got more.”

The legal costs of the High Court case have been estimated at least £400,000.