Randy Work, a finance executive formerly of Lone Star Funds, got divorced from ex-wife Mandy Gray a few years back. In 2015, a judge in London decreed that Work's fortune – worth an estimated $225 million – would be split cleanly down the middle between the pair, as per convention. Work disagreed with the decision, possibly motivated by the allegation that his ex-wife cheated on him while they were married, and tried to argue in an appeal before a three-judge panel that his financial "genius" entitled him to a greater share to the assets in question. According to media reports, the appeal failed, and the panel decided that Gray is indeed entitled to half of the fortune made while the two were married.
Work made this fortune in Japan, and depending on who you ask, it was either the result of his own "groundbreaking methodologies" used to maximize profits in Japan's distressed debt market, or, as a presiding judge put it in 2015, "being in the right place at the right time, or benefiting from a period of boom." That same judge evidently did not appreciate the "genius" argument in 2015, saying in his decision that "[t]he word 'genius' tends to be over-used and is properly reserved for Leonardo Da Vinci, Mozart, Einstein, and others like them."
Work's lawyers argued that Mandy was only entitled to 39 percent of the fortune, an exceptionally difficult case to make in the UK, where appeal judges have only ruled in favor of those that achieved their wealth through way of a "wholly exceptional nature" a handful of times. Also contributing to the court's decision were the pair's over 20 years of marriage as,"two strong and equal partners," during which Mandy gave up her job in the UK and agreed to move with Work to Japan, where he went on to make untold millions of dollars for Lone Star Funds. Since neither Work or Mandy had any serious financial assets when they met, and the entire fortune was made during the marriage, trying to get anything more than a 50/50 split in the divorce under the circumstances was a losing battle.
