When it rains, it pours…
Sep 4th, 2009 by Adrienne Keith
Here, from the sunny locale of LA, is a story about divorce
, infidelity, drug use and criminal prosecution in a matter where shareholders are demanding that Broadcom’s co-founder Henry Nicholas repay shareholders more than his net worth.
Nicholas and his former wife have over $1 billion in community property, which is likely the result of receiving stock in the company. Unfortunately, Nicholas is facing Federal indictment for distributing illegal drugs to friends and business associates, and for manipulating company stock options to provide $2.2 billion in benefits to employees of the microchip company without disclosing his actions to other shareholders. Ms. Nicholas was also accused of illegal drug use, although both parties consented to drug testing in 2006 and the results came back clean.
On a nerd note: Although the parties are divorced (i.e. their marriage has been legally ended), the community property has not been divided. In Washington, this is very, very uncommon. Typically, both separate and community property/debts are allocated when the marriage is ended.