Russell Simmons is taking his ex-wife, Kimora Lee Simmons, and her current husband, Tim Leissner, to court, accusing the couple of fraud.
The Def Jam cofounder filed a complaint earlier this week, obtained by People, in which he claims that Lee and Leissner conspired to fraudulently transfer almost 4 million shares of the energy-drink company Celsius to their accounts in order to help pay for Leissner’s legal and bail fees for a 2018 money laundering case in which he pleaded guilty. It also accuses the couple of breach of contract and breach of confidential relations.
Simmons and Lee were married from 1998 to 2009, despite breaking up in 2006, and have maintained a friendly relationship ever since, according to People, as both business partners and coparents to their two daughters, Ming and Aoki. In 2016, Lee and her now husband joined Simmons’s investment company, Nu Horizons, which is allegedly how these problems all began. In the filing, Simmons quoted a letter he wrote to Lee in an attempt to “reaffirm my 50% of the Celsius shares” without getting the court involved. “Throughout my entire decades-long partnership with you I’ve done everything and anything to protect and promote our family,” he wrote. “I have never said no to any request and have always gone against my own council to offer up much more than any judge would ever require of me in order to keep the peace. I am shocked and saddened to see how your side has behaved in response to my repeated attempts to get an agreement from you to rightfully and legally reaffirm my 50% of the Celsius shares which have been locked up with the government after being used for your husband’s bail money.”
Leissner, a former Goldman Sachs partner, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering and foreign bribery charges following around $4.5 billion being misappropriated from 1MDB, a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund, more than $200 million of which went directly to Leissner and another alleged conspirator, according to Forbes. In order to avoid jail time, the financier agreed to forfeit almost $44 million. Simmons’s complaint alleges that, “Knowing full well that Defendant Leissner would need tens of millions of dollars to avoid jail time, stay out on bail and forfeit monies for victim compensation, Defendants engaged in this blatant fraud to achieve that nefarious and unlawful goal.” It goes on to claim that Lee and Leissner “aided and abetted each other and together engaged in fraud” by unlawfully transferring funds owned by Simmons to their own account in 2018. According to People, the mogul says he didn’t learn about the transaction until July 2019.
Simmons is requesting a trial by jury and that Lee and Leissner pay him punitive damages and attorney legal fees, in addition to returning all of his Celsius shares.
In a statement to the Daily Mail, representatives for Lee said, “Kimora and her children are shocked by the extortive harassment coming from her ex-husband, Russell Simmons, who has decided to sue her for shares and dividends of Celsius stock in which Kimora and Tim Leissner invested millions of dollars.” The statement continued, “This is an ill-advised attempt by Russell to use the legal system to access funds he is in no way entitled to, and which his own legal team confirms Russell did not pay for. Russell’s continued aggressive behavior not only blatantly distorts the facts, but is simply a desperate PR ploy ignoring the years of mental and emotional anguish, gaslighting, and ongoing harassment he has inflicted on Kimora. Russell will be held accountable for his serial abuse and we will confront his baseless claims that he is warranted Celsius stock dividends despite his self-admitted zero contribution,” Lee’s representatives stated, per the Daily Mail. “This extortion attempt is especially egregious given that Russell remains contractually in debt to Kimora for millions of dollars in unpaid business loans. Our team is actively working to put a firm end to his harassment, which continues despite Russell having fled the country—he will face his own reckoning in the U.S. court.”
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