ASSOCIATED PRESS
June 4, 2008
ELIZABETH, N.J. -- It's now up to a judge to decide how much alimony and child support to award the soon-to-be ex-wife of New Jersey's gay ex-governor, following three weeks of testimony laying bare the couple's dire finances.
Lawyers delivered their final arguments Wednesday, wrapping up the money phase in the bitter divorce of Jim McGreevey and Dina Matos.
Matos has asked the judge for $2,500 a month alimony for four years, $1,750 a month support, and for McGreevey to foot her legal bills for the divorce, which exceed $250,000. McGreevey does not want to pay alimony, and is hoping to be assessed support payments of about $100 a month based on state guidelines factoring in the incomes of both parents and their custody arrangements.
The judge is not expected to rule until July, at the earliest.
A final phase in the divorce - Matos' claim that she was duped into marrying a gay man who thought he needed a wife to advance his political ambitions - won't be heard until after the money issues are settled. The fraud claim, if it reaches trial, could include salacious testimony from a former campaign aide who claims to have had sexual trysts with the McGreeveys.
During Wednesday's summation, Matos' lawyer John Post challenged McGreevey's claim that he's broke, saying the 50-year-old seminary student is intentionally under-earning to avoid paying alimony. Post also dismissed a claim by a McGreevey-hired employment expert who testified that the ex-gov is so tainted by scandal that he's "radioactive" in the work world.
"He finds himself where he is today because he is doing work he wants to do," said Post, who called McGreevey's dire financial situation "a contrived farce."
McGreevey lawyer Stephen Haller said his client doesn't owe Matos a dime in alimony based on a marriage lasting just four years before the couple split in 2004.
"We've got a marriage so short that kids date longer than these two were married," he said.
Matos and McGreevey are both deeply in debt, their grim finances made ever more difficult by exorbitant legal bills incurred in the divorce. Matos, who lost her job as a hospital fundraiser when the hospital closed last week, testified to owing about $750,000 for a mortgage, personal loan and legal bills. McGreevey said he owed his boyfriend more than $200,000, mostly for lawyers, and is $11,000 behind in support for a daughter from his first marriage. Neither have any savings.
