Divorce Settlement Heads to Supreme Court
Sally Harrison QC and Samantha Hillas from St John’s Buildings Chambers will be acting for Varsha Gohil in a hearing which starts on 8 June.
Mrs Gohil has been granted permission to seek a more substantial divorce settlement than the £270,000 she originally received in 2004.
In 2010 her former husband, Bhadresh Gohil, was jailed for 10 years for fraud and money laundering amounting to around £50m. During his trial, evidence of the extent to which he had hidden his wealth during the original settlement emerged.
The permission to take her case to the Supreme Court is the latest development in a lengthy legal battle. In June 2012 Moylan J in the High Court agreed Mrs Gohil could fight against the original settlement, and a hearing was fixed. The following March, however, her husband’s lawyers appealed, and the judges ruled in his favour, saying that the evidence from the criminal trial was not released by the Crown Prosecution Service, and therefore could not be used.
Mrs Gohil has now been granted permission to take her case to the Supreme Court.
She will stand alongside Alison Sharland, a second woman who is also seeking a new settlement after her own husband hid the true value of his wealth during divorce proceedings. Mrs Sharland had originally accepted a settlement but it later emerged that her husband’s company was worth millions of pounds more than he had claimed.
Expert Family barristers from St John’s Buildings will represent Mrs Gohil. Sally Harrison QC specialises in ancillary relief and financial provision, with particular emphasis on big money cases and those involving family businesses, pension sharing and inherited wealth.
Samantha Hillas has a particular specialism in financial proceedings upon relationship breakdown.
Click here to read the Irwin Mitchell press release
Click here to read the Daily Mail’s news story about the case
