Ex-banker left with £450,000 from £3m in divorce deal wins bigger share of fortune at Appeal Court



Helene Murphy leaving the High Court. Her share of the divorce settlement was cut from £1.9 million to £1.5 million today

A former banker has been granted an extra £370,000 in his divorce settlement after challenging the initial verdict.

The Court of Appeal said the judge was wrong to include William Murphy's company deferred compensation fund in its calculations.

The fund, from his former employer Merrill Lynch, was notionally valued at £550,000

The appeal judge also found that Mrs Justice Parker was not justified in ruling that Mr Murphy had wasted £2million of the family assets after separating from his wife, Helene, in 2006.

Lord Justice Thorpe, who headed the panel of three appeal judges, said the accusation was 'unfair to the husband'.

Mr Murphy, who worked for Salomon Brothers in New York and Merrill Lynch in London, will now get nearly £820,000. His wife's share was cut from £1.9million to £1.5million.

He can also claim the substantial legal costs of the case.

The assets of the couple, who were married in 1996 and have no children, have been split 65/35 in favour of Mrs Murphy.

Lord Justice Thorpe said this was justified as Mr Murphy had greater future earning potential.

The case came in the week a leading family lawyer called for an end to court rulings which left wives living in comfort on the back of their husbands' money.

Baroness Deech said handing a husband's wealth to the wife after a short childless marriage was demeaning to women who were fully capable of finding work.



She said such over-generosity to women had made London the divorce capital of the world.

At the time of Mr Murphy's settlement, the former banker was earning nothing, his lawyer Martin Pointer QC, had told the court.



But his wife Helene had a handsome income as a director of a London art gallery, he added.



Lord Justice Thorpe, who headed the panel of three appeal judges, said the couple met in New York where they were both working in 1997 and when he was posted to London, she gave up her job to follow him.



They married in Ireland in 1998 and separated in 2006. The couple, both in their early 40s, had no children.



Mr Murphy was a 'high earner' in the banking world until 2004 when he was made redundant and has not had a paid job since, said the judge.



The couple had enjoyed a 'lavish lifestyle' and lived in a £7 million house in Chelsea.

In the original divorce settlement the High Court judge Mrs Justice Parker gave about £1.88million to Mr Murphy's wife, two thirds of the couple's assets, plus her share of the Dublin company.



'The judge adopted a discriminatory approach to the question of need,' Mr Pointer had told the court.



Saying the judge had regarded the wife's needs as pre-eminent, he asked: 'How could this be so? The parties' needs called for equivalent consideration and, almost certainly, equal treatment.'



Lord Justice Thorpe said the battle over the assets of the marriage stretched over a period of two years at the end of which Mrs Justice Parker had included the deferred compensation scheme from Merrill Lynch as a liquid asset which was therefore divided between the parties on the 65/35 basis.



Lord Justice Thorpe said it was also pointed out to the judge by the husband's legal team that she had relied on evidence from the wife's team that Mr Murphy had wasted £2 million of the family money.



'The husband's team asserted the danger of the judge's reliance on a schedule (of expenditure) which was not agreed and not supported by evidence and which was plainly wrong in some instances.'



But Mrs Justice Parker had rejected both points and had not amended her final judgment, said the appeal judge.



Inequality: Ruth Deech claims current rules regarding divorce settlements are demeaning to women and unfair

Lord Justice Thorpe said the compensation scheme was not a liquid asset because it involved risk investments with no maturity date and was not available to the husband.



But he said the husband's claim that his former wife's share in an Irish company should also be part of the marriage assets failed because any return was likely to be 'very much in the future'.



The appeal judge said it was 'obvious' that the husband's compensation scheme and wife's third share in the Irish company should be taken out of the calculations for the settlement.



But Lord Justice Thorpe said the unequal share of the assets could be justified as a price the husband must pay for a clean break and to recognise the disparity in future earning capacity and access to capital.



'The husband asserted he had no prospects for the future but the judge roundly rejected that.'



He said that although the wife had retrained in the field of the arts, salaries were much lower than in banking.



Lady Justice Smith and Lord Justice Patten agreed with the ruling.

Lady Deech said in a lecture earlier this week: 'The notion a wife should get half of the joint assets of a couple after even a short, childless marriage has crept up on us without any parliamentary legislation to this effect.'



She added: 'It is no wonder England is the divorce capital of Europe and out of step with other European countries.'