Gloria Govan and Matt Barnes have ignited a new legal battle over back-owed child support and allegations of theft.
The Basketball Wives alum made a recent filing denying Barnes’ claims of having an oral agreement for reduced child support, Radar Online reported. Govan also denied spending tens of thousands in travel on Barnes’ American Express card.
“[Barnes] accused [Govan] of charging $22,635 on his Amex card, again claiming fraud, only to have [Govan] remind him in less than sensitive terms, that it was he who had charged that for ‘their sons,'” the filing states.
Govan has also “welcomed an
investigation as she completely and utterly denies using” Barnes’ AmEx card. According to the cannabis entrepreneur, Barnes “has attempted to extort” her in writing by threatening to “expose some dirty personal secret if she pursued her claim,” of back owed child support.Last year, Govan accused Barnes of owing $267k in back child support. She cited a court order of $10k a month in child support for their twin sons, Isaiah and Carter, that Barnes decided to reduce to $4k in 2020 without a formal agreement.
Govan claimed that Barnes told her he “didn’t want to” pay the full child support because he was “having a tough time with his girlfriend and her kids living with him, along with a new child coming.” Despite his verbal plea, Govan says “There is no agreement to reduce support.”
In an alleged attempt to get Govan to agree to the reduced child support, Govan claimed that’s when Barnes started threatening her with accusations of using his AmEx card for her travel expenses. According to Govan, Barnes “attempted to claim that he was instituting a police investigation over [Govan’s] allegedly unauthorized use of his Amex card, which he would drop if she dropped her claims.”
However, Barnes is doubling down on his claims against his ex-wife in his filing.
“Each time she booked travel for herself on my AmEx, it appears she logged into my account and surreptitiously changed the email address to hers, then booked travel and received the confirmation at her email address, only to immediately change the email address on the account back to mine once she received her travel confirmation so that I would be none the wiser,” his filing states.
The NBA champion estimates that Govan has stolen “thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars” through his AmEx card. But Govan is encouraging an investigation to shut down Barnes’ claims.
Barnes and Govan married in 2013 and separated in 2015 before finalizing their divorce one year later. She went on to marry his former teammate Derek Fisher in July 2021. Barnes revealed plans to have Fisher testify in an upcoming hearing.
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