We are finishing up our discussion of Patrick Arbor’s unconventional — and illegal — approach to his divorce. Arbor was the chairman of the Chicago Board of Trade in the 1990s and was a member of the city’s business elite until he fled the country this summer.
His ex-wife, Antoinette Vigilante, filed for divorce in 2011. Both parties asked for temporary restraining orders to keep one another from transferring assets out of the country. The court granted Vigilante’s request but lifted the injunction last year. That was when Arbor reportedly began moving money to off-shore accounts.
In court, Vigilante painted herself as a devoted homemaker who took care of her husband as he fought cancer in 2010. Arbor disagreed. He said that at most she “assisted” during his radiation treatments but had not helped at all during his two surgeries. She was, he said, enjoying her lifestyle at their Florida home.
That was only one of Arbor’s arguments against a maintenance award. Arbor asserted that Vigilante’s real estate experience should be enough to support her after their divorce. She is able to earn an income, he explained, but “instead has focused her efforts on her self-described ‘lifestyle’ and on spending money rather than earning it.”
The court recently awarded Vigilante almost $20 million for her share of marital property and maintenance, and that was apparently the breaking point for the 76-year-old businessman. He left the country with tens of millions of dollars to avoid paying Vigilante anything.
As we have discussed in other posts, though, disobeying a court order can lead to jail time. The court has issued a bench warrant for Arbor’s arrest in light of his repeated violations of multiple court orders, including orders to pay Vigilante $288,983 in spousal maintenance.
The divorce brought many of Arbor’s financial irregularities to light, as well. He was forced to pay 30-years’ worth of taxes after his wife’s attorneys discovered he had not paid income taxes on foreign assets. He referred to their action as blackmail.
Arbor was in Italy the last anyone heard. He is a citizen of that country.
Source: Chicago Sun-Times, “Ex-CBOT chair’s divorce messy, rich with intrigue,” Mark Brown, Oct. 7, 2013Crain’s Chicago, “Ex-CBOT chief Patrick Arbor admits he dodged taxes for 30 years,” Shia Kapos, Oct. 8, 2013
