Trinny Woodall trapped in bizarre divorce lawsuit from beyond the grave
Former What Not to Wear presenter Trinny Woodall is fighting a legal bid to make her responsible for the debts of her dead ex-husband.
In 2009, after she and Johnny Elichaoff split, she was awarded £24,000 a year in maintenance, as well as the repayment of £1.4 million that she had lent him during their ten-year marriage.
However, shortly before the divorce was finalised, Elichaoff was declared bankrupt, and a judge ordered the original settlement invalid. And the former drummer, who later managed Tears for Fears, who was addicted to painkillers following a serious road accident, killed himself in 2014 by jumping from a car park roof.
Woodall never received a penny, and has supported the couple's daughter, aged five at the time of the split, single-handed ever since. She is now in a relationship with millionaire art collector Charles Saatchi.
This, though, hasn't stopped Elichaoff's creditors from pursuing Woodall for the money, much of which was owed to Westminster School as unpaid rent on a flat.
According to the Daily Telegraph, the officially appointed trustee Mr Elichaoff's bankruptcy, Ian Robert, is now arguing that Woodall should pay his £285,000 debts, plus legal bills.
"This is a nightmare for an innocent spouse who received nothing on divorce, yet years later is sued by a trustee in bankruptcy, asserting an unheard-of claim to spousal rights of her deceased ex-husband," a spokesman says.
However, Robert's lawyers claim that the divorce settlement was unfair. Given that Woodall earned ten times as much money as her husband, they say, she should have been paying him - and this 'entitlement' to maintenance should be counted as part of Elichaoff's assets.
"It would be wholly bizarre if such a valuable right did not pass to a bankrupt's trustee," claimed barrister James Pickering.
The case has already been thrown out once, but is now being appealed, with judge Robin Dicker reserving judgement till a later date.
However, Robert is unlikely to succeed in his bid to get the money, with Woodall's lawyer arguing that in 200 years of divorce law, there has never been a similar successful case.
