Here we go again with the earrings. Erika Jayne has fought tooth and nail against every lawsuit she has against her. Her estranged husband, Tom Girardi, fell from grace in 2020 after being accused of embezzling client settlement funds to fund his lavish lifestyle. Which has been alleged in every single lawsuit against him. Given that Erika was his wife of 20+ years, lawsuits are suggesting that she benefited from the allegedly swindled funds. Some have even accused the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star of knowing what Tom was up to.
Erika has always denied the claims. But she’s still not making any moves to help recover whatever funds she can for the victims. Case in point, giving up a pair of $1.4 million diamond earrings Tom bought her. As reported by Page Six, Erika is appealing a court order by a judge requiring her to turn them over.
In order to try and keep the earrings, Erika filed the appeal requesting to be heard by the United States District Court. Given the the earrings are part of bankruptcy proceedings, her case would typically be heard by the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel. The judge in the June 28th hearing determined that Erika’s expensive earrings were purchased with “settlement funds from the trust account created for a class-action handled by Thomas’ firm Girardi Keese.”
The judge added that he did not believe Erika had knowledge that the jewelry was bought with allegedly stolen funds. Regardless, she still has to give them to the trustee on the Chapter 7 bankruptcy case against Girardi Keese. The once powerful law firm now owes a whopping $500 million in debt.
Tom bought the earrings for Erika back in 2007 for $750k. He allegedly used money directly from a client’s trust account. The appreciated value of the earrings are now $1.4 million. And per the court order, Erika can’t sell them for cash either. Original court filings from the trustee state,“Erika has no legal or equitable right to the Diamond Earrings and the same are legally and equitably valuable assets of the GK Bankruptcy Estate that the Trustee can and should sell.”
Her lawyer, who is no doubt over hearing about these earrings, argued that Erika shouldn’t be responsible for any of Tom’s alleged misdeeds. He stated last month, “Legally, the judge’s decision raises an important issue of whether the law allows revisiting transactions of 15 years ago to take away a gift received by an innocent spouse. But that’s for a higher court to decide.”
TELL US – WHY WON’T ERIKA JUST TURN OVER THE EARRINGS? DO YOU THINK SHE SHOULD BE ABLE TO KEEP THEM? WILL SHE WIN HER APPEAL?
[Photo Credit: Bravo]
