Messy divorce for Walmart heiress
A third gen of the Walmart dynasty is facing a difficult divorce from her husband of six years, after filing a civil lawsuit claiming he stole money from her during their marriage.
Paige Laurie is divorcing her husband Patrick "Bo" Dubbert citing irreconcilable differences, but also lodged a civil suit on the grounds he siphoned cash from a business they operated together.
Laurie, the granddaughter of Bud Walton, the brother of Walmart founder Sam Walton, and Dubbert owned a shopping centre in Malibu that Dubbert managed.
According to website TMZ, Laurie alleges Dubbert convinced her to let him hire a friend as a co-manger, the pair then declared themselves general contractors and upped their salaries from $15,000 (€11,000) a month to $70,000.
She also claims Dubbert paid himself an additional $250,000 a year to manage the shopping centre on top of his other fees.
To add insult to injury, Laurie signed a prenuptial agreement prior to her wedding in 2008, which gave her husband, whom she met in high school, the right to spousal support if they ever divorced.
Laurie is the only child of Nancy Walton Laurie. Her mother and her aunt, Ann Walton Kroenke, together own a Walmart stake worth more than $6 billion.
The family caused controversy in 2004 by paying $25 million to have the naming rights for the new basketball arena at the University of Missouri, naming it the Paige Sports Arena, despite the fact she had never attended the university and had graduated from the University of Southern California.
In 2005, Laurie returned her communications degree to her alma mater, after her former roommate told US news show 20/20 that she had been paid over $20,000 over four years to do Laurie's homework for her.
Her parents agreed to allow the University of Missouri to rename its basketball arena the Mizzou Arena after the university's nickname.
The Walmart retail empire has created some of the world's biggest fortunes – Laurie's cousin by marriage Christy Walton is the world's wealthiest woman, with a net worth of $38.5 billion, while Jim, Alice and S Robson Walton all weigh in at the top end of the Forbes Rich List with multi-billion dollar fortunes.
