The bizarre battle over the estate of late billionaire Richard Pratt is set to heat up, with the NSW Supreme Court ordering a former escort who claims she was Pratt’s mistress to hand over all pictures and video footage featuring her, Pratt and another of Pratt’s mistresses, Shari-Lea Hitchcock.
Madison Ashton, a former escort and Penthouse Pet, has lodged a claim against Pratt’s $5 billion estate claiming the entrepreneur promised to set up $2.5 million trust funds for each of her children and pay her an annual retainer of $500,000 for her upkeep. She is claiming damages for breach of contract.
Hitchcock, who is the mother of Pratt’s youngest daughter Paula, has also lodged a claim against the estate.
But while the cases are clearly bringing unwanted attention for the Pratt family and particularly Pratt’s wife Jeanne Pratt, who is also executor of his will, an expert on estate law says the Pratt legal team may have decided to draw a line in the sand and put pressure on the claimants.
The Ashton case returned to court on October 22, where the two sides were battling over access to documents they want to see produced.
Justice Paul Brereton ordered Ashton’s legal team to produce “records of bookings or payments” Pratt made for “escort services or other sexually related services” with either Ashton or Hitchcock and “all photographs, videos and audio recordings made” showing Aston with Richard Pratt or Shari-Lea Hitchcock.
And in an even more bizarre twist, Ashton’s legal team has been asked to produce documents relating to sexual or other service provided by Ashton “to, or for the benefit of, Shari-Lea Hitchcock, in the presence of Shari-Lea Hitchcock, or at the request of Shari-Lea Hitchcock.”
Ashton will also have to produce records about the income of her businesses, which she says she gave up after being offered a contract by Richard Pratt.
However, the judge denied a request from Ashton’s legal team that the Pratt estate produce records showing bookings or payments the late mogul may have made for escort or similar services.
Lawyer and estate planner, Tony Kelly, who has dealt with a number of high-profiled and high-valued estates, says the bizarre circumstances of the case and the relationships between the parties has makes it particularly noteworthy.
But he says the nature of the Ashton’s claim – which seeks damages for breach of contract, rather than for a slice of Pratt’s will – is unusual.
“The more standard claim is when someone believes that the will maker should have make more provision for them in the will,” Kelly says.
“As we always say, where’s there’s a will there is a relative, and where there is a relative there is a court case.”
Kelly says the way legal costs operate in estate claims – legal bills generally come out of the amount in the estate – means cases can often be settled quickly and while the wealthy Pratt family might not be concerned about the impact of legal costs, they would not be enjoying the publicity the case is attracting.
However, Kelly argues the Pratt family and their legal team may have decided to take a stance against the legal claims it now faces and put some pressure back on the claimants to prove their case.
“It appears that they’ve decided it’s probably time to draw the line in the sand.”
The case returns to court in late November.
James was the editor and publisher of SmartCompany and LeadingCompany for five years. He is now the Australian Financial Review‘s companies & markets editor, and a former BRW editor.
