On Monday, it was revealed that Frederick Barclay is yet to pay a penny of the divorce award, according to a lawyer for Hiroko Barclay, his ex-wife, who told a London court that her legal team wasn’t left with another option but to prepare a bankruptcy petition against the “completely unrepentant” tycoon.
Frederick Barclay, the exiled tycoon who owes his former wife £100 million, is looking forward to a financial settlement with her after being endangered with bankruptcy.
According to a lawyer for Hiroko Barclay, who told a London court on Monday her legal team was left with little choice but to prepare a bankruptcy petition against the “completely unrepentant” tycoon that the 88-year-old still has to pay a penny of the divorce award. The settlement offer to end the divorce fight was made on February 10, the same day as Frederick was about to meet his nephew Howard.
The high profile divorce suit and other recent court cases lodged against the tycoon have pushed the famously secretive Barclay family’s troubles before the public eye with revelations of quarrels on yachts and bugged hotel rooms in London’s Ritz Hotel. Frederick even pleaded poverty and asked for government money to help fund his legal woes. He skipped jail but was still found in contempt of court last year for not being able to pay his former spouse thousands of pounds in legal fees.
Barclay’s lawyers professed in court filings that an imprisonment was inappropriate in light of his age and that he was extremely short of funds and nearing bankruptcy.
A petition for bankruptcy would “doubtless cause the personal guarantee he and his late brother gave in respect of the business’s borrowings to come crashing down,” Stuart Leech, Hiroko’s lawyer, said of Frederick and his late twin brother David. He cautioned that private documents would likely be made available in such proceedings.
Judge Jonathan Cohen, who has often been critical of Barclay and his nephews, adjourned the hearing until next month.
“It is absolutely essential that Lady Barclay is properly provided for and it is unlikely that this case will go away before that time,” Cohen said.
Earlier, lawyers for Barclay argued he couldn’t make the payments to his former wife, after the end of their 34-year marriage, in one of the largest divorce awards in London court history. They said efforts to get the required funds had been frustrated by his daughter and nephews who were in charge of the family business after a fallout with David.
