Palimony Claim Against Mudd Estate Is Rejected : Litigation: The jury declines to award any money to a mistress of the late millionaire. She had sought $5 million.

A Superior Court jury Wednesday rejected a palimony suit brought against the estate of the late multimillionaire Henry T. Mudd by one of his seven mistresses, denying the woman who had asked for $5 million a single cent in compensation.

Eleanor (Lorraine) Oliver, 41, who saw Mudd for 13 years before she sued him months before his death in 1990, said that she was “obviously very disappointed.”

“It’s been 2 1/2 years of hell,” Oliver said, her eyes brimming with tears.

Oliver’s attorney, Marvin Mitchelson, said he would appeal the case, in which Oliver had asked for $4.2 million palimony, a $600,000 house in Studio City and an unspecified amount in emotional damages.

Mudd’s wife, Vanessa--once one of the mistresses--married Mudd less than a year before his death. She said she was pleased that the money Oliver asked for would now benefit students at Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, which Henry Mudd co-founded in his father’s name in 1955.

“This is what I expected, but I’m certainly relieved,” said Mudd, clutching a wedding picture of herself and Henry Mudd outside the courtroom. “Greed will not prevail.”

The jury’s decision capped a three-week trial that unveiled Mudd’s private life, revealing he had affairs with as many as seven women at once. Witnesses testified that the women knew each other and that Mudd vacationed with more than one woman at a time, lavishing luxuries on them.

Oliver claimed in her lawsuit that she agreed to provide Mudd wife-like companionship. In return, she said, he set up trust funds that would support her for life and provided her with the Studio City house.

She claimed he reneged on the agreement after he married Vanessa Mudd in 1990, halting Oliver’s $8,400 a month allowance and revoking her trusts. After he died several months later at age 76, the executors of his estate evicted her from the house.

The executors, who became the defendants in the suit after Mudd’s death, denied that a contract existed and contended that Oliver gave up any inheritance rights when she sued Mudd.

That argument apparently swayed jurors. They unanimously found that Mudd and Oliver had a relationship that was based on more than sex for pay. But they voted 10 to 2 that Oliver did not live up to the terms of the contract.