Lisa Marie Presley has been accused of deliberately hiding her vast wealth from her estranged husband, Michael Lockwood in their ongoing divorce battle, a court heard Wednesday.
The couple – whose marriage fell apart in 2016 – are locked in a bitter court fight in which Lockwood is asking Presley to pay him $22,000 a month spousal support.
Lisa Marie makes around $4.2 million a year, or $350,000 a month – mostly from the trust her father King of Rock Elvis Presley set up for her.
But at Los Angeles Superior Court, Lockwood’s attorney Jeff Sturman complained to Judge Patrick Cathcart that a list of Presley’s assets and debts that her lawyers provided to the court is ‘completely useless.’
Lisa Marie Presley showed up at court on Wednesday dressed in a pink and gray mini-dress with a pink bow at the front, blue spike heels and her hair in a pony tail
Her cash-strapped estranged husband Michael Lockwood (seen with her in 2015) claims that she is hiding millions from the court as he chases after spousal support payments
Lisa Marie is seen being escorted by an unidentified man out of court on Wednesday
He went down all the items of the list – including household furnishings, miscellaneous jewelry, stocks, bonds, mutual funds, retirement funds and pensions and her father’s trust.
And against each item Presley’s lawyers had written ‘value unknown.’
Sturman scoffed at the notion Lisa Marie would not know what all these items are worth and described her claims as ‘frankly false.’
‘This is somebody who is making a deliberate choice to fail to disclose,’ he told the court.
‘What is in the trust? Is she holding $50 million there? We don’t know. We don’t know what she’s worth because they won’t give us any documents.’
Sturman asked Judge Cathcart to compel Presley to turn over all her financial documents and and to impose a financial penalty on her for not disclosing required information.
Lisa Marie’s lawyer, Gary Fishbein, countered that he had offered Sturman a revised list of her assets and debts but his offer was ‘ignored.’
He also said he was ‘about to’ hand over Presley’s 2016 tax returns to Lockwood’s lawyers.
Lisa Marie and Lockwood are seen at the 2013 CMT Awards. He is asking for $22,000 a month in spousal support and claims it is a pittance compared to the lifestyle he was accustomed to
Lisa Marie, who turned 50 last week, showed up at court dressed in a pink and gray mini-dress with a pink bow at the front, blue spike heels and her hair in a pony tail.
She is fighting Lockwood’s demands, including a claim for hundreds of thousands of dollars in attorney fees.
Musician Lockwood, 56 – who arrived at the courthouse wearing a gray suit and tie with a black fedora and sporting a salt ’n pepper beard – married Lisa Marie in 2006 and the couple has nine-year-old twin daughters, Finley and Harper.
Whether Lockwood is entitled to spousal support from Presley hinges on whether a post-nuptial agreement – which the couple signed in 2007 – is ruled valid or invalid by the court.
The agreement said that neither party should have a claim on the other if the marriage broke up.
But Lockwood is demanding that the prenup should be torn up, saying he was coerced into signing it.
Fishbein argued that there was no point in contesting whether Lisa Marie has to pay spousal support to Lockwood or not.
‘It’s totally meaningless,’ he said. ‘If the post-nuptial agreement is ruled valid, there is no spousal support.’
Judge Cathcart decided to continue (postpone) the case until after the post-nuptial issue is settled and referred it to a different courtroom at LA Superior Court where Judge Thomas Lewis set a trial date of August 13.
But Judge Lewis also scheduled a mandatory settlement conference for June 8 in the hope that Presley, Lockwood and their lawyers can reach an agreement without having to go to trial.
Lisa Marie Presley is seen leaving Los Angeles Superior Court after a hearing on Wednesday
Lockwood meanwhile says in court documents that he has been reduced from living in luxury with Elvis Presley’s only child, to having just $435 in his bank account and earning only $20-$25 an hour as a part-time guitar technician and musician.
He also claims he has around $50,000 of credit card debt and owes his lawyers almost $300,000.
He wants his estranged wife to pay him $263,000 a year so that he can ‘enjoy a lifestyle that is closer to my marital status of living….and it will be substantially above the subsistence standard of living at which I am currently living.’
His lifestyle with Lisa Marie – including lavish entertaining, expensive vacations and flying on private jets – cost around $64,000 per month, he estimated in court documents.
But now, he’s ‘only’ asking for a third of that amount – $21,925 – from her to pay for expenses including $10,000 a month for renting a three-bedroom house close to his daughters, $2,425 a month for entertaining and vacations, plus $5,000 year for birthday and Christmas gifts for his twin girls.
Lisa Marie and Lockwood are seen in 2013
When the couple appeared in the same court in February last year, Lockwood was seeking $40,000 a month in spousal support and $100,000 in attorney fees. But Lisa Marie didn’t want to pay Lockwood a dime, claiming that her $300 million fortune was gone and her only income was $100,000 a month from her father, Elvis Presley’s trust and $4,000 a month from Graceland, her dad’s famous home in Memphis, TN.
Her attorney, Mark Gross, told the court at that time that Lisa Marie was ‘buried in debt,’ and among a ‘laundry list’ of debts, ‘she owed over $1 million in taxes for 2015 alone.’
Gross listed over $17,000 monthly expenses that Lisa Marie claims for her children’s day to day care.
He said that a house she owned in UK was ‘upside down’ in debt and that Lisa Marie ‘has no assets.’
Judge Cathcart did order Presley – in that February 2017 hearing – to pay $50,000 of Lockwood’s attorney fees. But he refused to grant Lockwood’s plea for spousal support.
Just before that hearing last year their divorce case took a sensational turn when DailyMail.com revealed that Lisa Marie claimed in court papers that she had found hundreds of indecent photos and disturbing videos of children on Lockwood’s computer.
‘I was shocked and horrified and sick to my stomach,’ said Lisa Marie.
Lockwood denied the allegations and while the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation did look into the claims, no charges were filed.