Kerkorians Escalate Their War of Words

The war of words escalated Friday in the bitter child-support battle between Kirk and Lisa Kerkorian, with each accusing the other of engaging in misleading, bare-knuckled legal tactics to the detriment of the 3-year-old girl at the center of the dispute.

MGM mogul Kirk Kerkorian, 84, said in court papers filed Thursday that former tennis pro Lisa Kerkorian, 36, “deceived” him into believing he was the child’s biological father until a DNA test in November 2000 “scientifically excluded” him. He said he told Lisa Kerkorian about the DNA results months ago.

On Friday, Lisa Kerkorian’s lawyer fired back in a written statement in which he neither confirmed nor disputed the paternity test’s existence.

“Whether or not there’s a DNA test is legally irrelevant and morally outrageous,” said attorney Stephen A. Kolodny. He said Kerkorian’s denial was “completely inconsistent” with his sworn statements in previous court proceedings acknowledging that he was the father of Kira Kerkorian.

To now deny paternity, Kolodny said, was “a particularly cruel tactic to use against a small child.”

Kolodny was in court Friday and was not available for further questions.

Kerkorian believed he was Kira’s father when he acknowledged paternity in August 1999--more than a year before the DNA test, said his lawyer, Dennis M. Wasser. Kerkorian continues to provide monthly child support for Kira, who turns 4 in March, Wasser added.

Last month, Lisa Kerkorian initiated the public legal battle by filing a request for $320,000 in monthly child support, accompanied by a 33-page declaration detailing her relationship with Kirk Kerkorian. Her court filing laid bare details of their brief 1999 marriage and divorce, as well as the lavish lifestyle they shared--multimillion-dollar real estate transactions, dozens of trips to Las Vegas and Hawaii aboard the MGM jet, and a $70,000 first birthday party for Kira at the Hotel Bel-Air.

Lisa Kerkorian is asking a Los Angeles Superior Court judge to award the record amount of child support to sustain the lifestyle she claims her daughter enjoyed until her relationship with Kirk Kerkorian chilled.

In statements issued Friday, her lawyer challenged Kirk Kerkorian’s credibility and said he was shirking his duty as a parent. Kolodny’s sharply worded statement accused Kerkorian of waging an “ongoing campaign against his 3-year-old daughter, Kira, in his attempt to avoid supporting her.”

“They launched the campaign,” the billionaire’s lawyer retorted. “They filed it in a public forum rather than in the private paternity action.”

Kirk Kerkorian, in his own 25-page court declaration, said that he loves Kira, has set up a trust fund for her education and is willing to continue paying up to $50,000 a month in child support until she turns 18. But, he added, he has tired of Lisa Kerkorian’s escalating financial demands, charging that she is using the child as a “pawn.”

In his declaration, Kirk Kerkorian said he values his privacy, and gave Lisa Kerkorian tens of millions of dollars to keep her happy and silent. He now is suing her for breaching half a dozen confidentiality agreements concerning their marriage and divorce and the issue of Kira’s paternity.

Kirk Kerkorian said he submitted samples of his and Kira’s hair for the DNA test after Lisa Kerkorian continued making financial demands and threats to go public with details of their relationship.

Kira was born in March 1998, about nine months after a weeklong reconciliation in the couple’s rocky relationship. They met in 1986 and became romantically involved in 1991. She claims the relationship continued for nearly a decade. He claims it was essentially over by 1995.

Kirk Kerkorian said he agreed to marry Lisa in August 1999 because he “was extremely concerned about her emotional state and how it might affect Kira.” He said that she felt society “looked down” on her because she had had a child out of wedlock and that she wanted to “legitimize” Kira, even though the child was 17 months old.

She said in her declaration that she was heartbroken after he insisted that she divorce him, as agreed, a month after they married. He lost interest in her, she said, when he could no longer use his money and power to control her.

The deal-breaker, according to his declaration, was her demand in September 2000 for a $25-million trust fund. “Finally--and belatedly--I had had enough,” he said. He refused, and sought the DNA test.

“By late 2000, I seriously questioned whether my paternity of Kira was simply a fabrication,” he said. By then, he added, “I already had developed a close bond with Kira.” He said he considers himself her “psychological father.”

His relationship with Lisa Kerkorian became increasingly acrimonious after the divorce became final in January 2000. Each dispatched police to the other’s home. Finally, matters came to a head at Christmas last year. He had given Kira a toy Mickey Mouse phone and a pet bunny on Christmas Eve.

On Christmas morning, he said, Lisa Kerkorian phoned him “dozens of times,” then came to his house, tossing the Mickey Mouse phone over the fence. It broke into pieces.

She “then threatened my houseman that if I did not come to the phone, she was ‘going to throw the rabbit over [the fence] next,”’ his court papers say.

“Since then,” Kirk Kerkorian said, he and Lisa Kerkorian have “barely” spoken. “There is nothing to say.” Because of the tension between them, he hasn’t seen Kira since Christmas Eve.