Tim Leissner, the disgraced onetime star banker for Goldman Sachs who was sentenced to prison for his role in the 1MDB scandal, has reportedly filed for divorce from Kimora Lee Simmons.
Leissner cited “irreconcilable differences” in his split from the former reality TV star and Baby Phat mogul, TMZ reported earlier this week.
The court filings do not list the date the couple separated, according to the site. Sources told TMZ that Leissner and Simmons have been living apart since at least March 2022.
Leissner is reportedly asking for joint legal and physical custody of their 11-year-old daughter Wolfe Lee Leissner. The couple had been married since March 2014.
In June 2018, Leissner was arrested by federal agents in Washington, DC, in connection with the 1MDB corruption and money-laundering scandal.
He and a former colleague at Goldman, Roger Ng, were charged with helping Malaysian financier Jho Low steal hundreds of millions of dollars from the 1MDB sovereign development fund.
Later that same year, Leissner pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and to laundering money.
In May of last year, he was sentenced to two years in prison.
In 2022, Leissner admitted in court that he exchanged vows with Simmons while still legally wed to his previous spouse, Judy Chan Leissner.
He also admitted that he twice faked his divorce in order to re-marry.
Leissner testified that he used tens of millions of dollars in illicit funds that he pocketed from 1MDB to subsidize a lavish lifestyle.
The German-born banker also testified that he engaged in multiple extramarital affairs, including one with a woman who blackmailed him in order to get him to splurge $10 million for a mansion.
Simmons married hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons in 1998 after meeting him as a teenage model, launching a high-profile relationship that produced two daughters — and later unraveled into a bitter split, divorce and years of public feuding over money and parenting.
The fallout turned increasingly acrimonious, with Kimora accusing Russell of being “abusive” toward women while he fired back with claims of financial misconduct and interference in his relationship with their children, dragging their family disputes into the spotlight.
The legal drama escalated in 2021 when Russell sued Kimora and Leissner, alleging they used his roughly 4 million shares in Celsius as collateral to cover legal bills tied to the 1MDB scandal.
Russell Simmons has been accused by multiple women of sexual misconduct, allegations he has denied.
