The Secrecy Surrounding Jeff Bezos’ Divorce Is Highly Unusual, Says Top Attorney
[Source: Bravo]
The Amazon founder and his wife of 25 years, MacKenzie Bezos, split — and no one knows where the money’s going.
Every day, more details about Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ affair with Lauren Sanchez come to light. They’ve been photographed by paparazzi dining out together, canoodling in public, flying private together, and hot tubbing at Sanchez’s beachfront home in Santa Monica.
What’s remained a mystery though, are the details of his divorce from longtime wife MacKenzie Bezos, who helped him build Amazon from an online bookseller to the No.1 online retail dealer it is today.
According to Los Angeles divorce attorney Peter Walzer, founding partner of Walzer-Melcher law firm, the terms of the divorce have been kept under wraps so well, no one even knows who exactly is representing either Bezos or his ex in the case.
“Somehow there are a lot of things that don’t get any traction, and we’ve had clients who cared about publicity and we took care to keep it private and no one cared,” Walzer told Personal Space. “But I’ve gotten calls from Good Morning Britain, morning shows in Australia, all around the world, [this divorce] has become the hot thing because of the wealth. When it’s the wealthiest person in the world it gets a lot of traction.”
The only problem is, no one really knows specifics.
“Nobody knows whether the deal is done or not,” Walzer said. “Nobody knows who’s representing either one of them. It’s the great unknown. They have all the money in the world and they can keep it private. They had that explosion two weeks ago and they put out that statement, and now they’re creating some uncertainty in the market and everyone is speculating who’s gonna control the stock in the company so people are curious.”
He added that it’s impossible the two can keep all the details private for long, and that the two are likely “tying the final knots on a deal” that will soon be made public.
“They want the news to settle about the affairs, and it seems like they were hacked. It’s virtually impossible to stay private with that much wealth. You think he would have the CIA guarding them. This is one of the biggest divorces in U.S. history and there’s a lot of money and power at stake. They also want the public to believe it’s amicable.”
“No one has heard about a pre- or post-nup, and there’s $137 billion on the line,” Walzer continued, adding that in the end it seems like they are hammering out a deal to split their assets and charities in a fair way. “There will be trades for power, for stock, or money but so far no disclosure.”
He did note that in cases like this, a deal tends to happen very quickly. “These things are not simple, but public image is very important to them and there’s enough to go around, so the only reason they would fight is emotions. It’s likely they will put out a statement [once everything is resolved]. There will have to be public disclosures of ownership and stock and titles, it’s just a matter of when.”
by Marianne Garvey January 24, 2019, • 11:12 AM ET
