Laura Overdeck has been barred from testifying in her record-breaking New Jersey divorce case after a judge found she hacked her husband’s email, stole his mail, and destroyed evidence.
New Jersey Family Court Judge Bruce Buechler determined that Laura Overdeck, 54, “engaged in multiple discovery abuses,” according to a transcript of a prior hearing, citing several examples of what amounted to domestic espionage and evidence destruction. The ruling means Overdeck will be unable to testify or call expert witnesses in what her attorney has dubbed the Garden State’s most expensive contested divorce.
Those abuses included illicitly accessing her husband’s private computer to take photos of emails he exchanged with his lawyers, breaking into his post office box, and deleting evidence from her phone, Buechler said. The judge found in April that Laura Overdeck had snapped pics on her cell of her spouse’s emails discussing legal strategy — and then failed to produce the phone, according to the transcript.
Despite court orders, she didn’t turn over the phone “until at least 13 months later” — and the images had been deleted, with Overdeck claiming the device was running out of memory, according to Buechler. “Whether Ms. Overdeck did it maliciously or accidentally is not relevant,” Buechler said. “There’s a cumulative effect here.”
The ruling also found that Overdeck had convinced the post office to provide her with an extra key to her estranged husband’s private P.O. Box “so she could access the mail in that box” — but she refused to say what she took or to return it. Buechler opted to dismiss Overdeck’s divorce complaint — calling it the “ultimate sanction” — severely limiting her options in the Newark courtroom.
Grilling him on cross-examination will be the main way for her to make her case, as a result of her “multiple discovery abuses,” according to the ruling. She’ll be legally barred from presenting a single shred of affirmative evidence, testifying in support of her claim, or calling her own high-priced valuation experts to the stand.
But Buechler made clear that “the assets need to be equitably distributed,” meaning that the Overdeck fortune will still need splitting up. At issue is whether Overdeck can claim her husband’s stake in Two Sigma as a marital asset. Her attorneys estimate a 35% stake amounts to a whopping $6.2 billion. But John Overdeck’s lawyers argue the Manhattan-based investment firm was founded two years before the couple’s 2002 nuptials.
On the first day of testimony last week, Laura Overdeck’s lawyer Theresa Lyons revealed that she previously rejected a paltry offer of $633 million to settle the matter, according to Bloomberg. The financier’s attorney, Jonathan Wolfe, said it was actually a $723 million tax-free equitable distribution. He also denied the $6.2 billion figure, saying that a 35% piece of John Overdeck’s company shares amounted to $4.9 billion.
Laura Overdeck is also suing the law firm responsible for the family’s estate planning, claiming that they secretly helped “divorce-proof” her husband’s assets while they were allegedly also representing her. Her legal team is appealing Buechler’s ruling, and that process is ongoing. They declined to comment Monday.
In the viral moment that preceded this ruling, the scale of the Overdeck divorce had already drawn national attention for its staggering dollar figures and bitter courtroom tactics. The case pits one of Wall Street’s most successful quantitative investors against his wife of more than two decades, with the future of an $80 billion hedge fund empire hanging in the balance. The sanctions against Laura Overdeck represent one of the most severe penalties a family court judge can impose, effectively silencing one side in a case where billions are at stake.
Billionaire John Overdeck, 54, was expected to take the stand Tuesday in Newark to begin his testimony in the proceedings.