Frank Says, Jamie Says

It's Opening Day for a spousal support hearing involving the McCourts

An attorney for Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt says his client is willing to pay $150,000 in monthly spousal support to his estranged wife.

Jamie McCourt's requested amount? One million dollars. 

Both Jamie and Frank McCourt arrived in court at about 8:30 a.m., flanked by teams of attorneys, Monday for their spousal support hearing. Frank McCourt entered through and underground parking area.

All action in court Monday morning involved attorneys. No witnesses spoke in court.

Jamie McCourt estimates she has about $4 million in savings and roughly $450,000  in cash that will soon be drained due to monthly mortgage payments of about  $415,000 on the couple's homes and vacation properties, according to recently  filed documents in the Los Angeles Superior Court case.

She alleges that Frank McCourt has at least $18 million available that could  help pay for her spousal support.  However, Frank McCourt said earlier this month that he will only earn about  $5 million this year. His attorneys argue that Jamie McCourt should be denied  $1 million in spousal support because she has assets worth more than $75  million. 

Attorney Dennis Wasser told Superior Court Commissioner Scott Gordon his client deserves $1 million a month to keep up with the bills and maintain the lavish lifestyle she enjoyed during her marriage.

"The marital style at the time, every need, every want these people had was met," Wasser said.

Frank McCourt's lawyers called her request "obscene." They said Frank McCourt will give her several vacant properties, including a mansion in Holmby Hills. Jamie McCourt is already using the mansion to store furniture, according to attorneys.

Wasser said Jamie McCourt's mortgages and related expenses total $568,000 a month -- more than half of what she is asking from her husband. Wasser said his client is also behind on her attorney fees by $800,000.

Jamie McCourt cited a list of other expenses she and her husband had during their marriage such as trips to Paris and Vietnam, country club memberships and dining at expensive restaurants. She said she enjoys wearing designer clothing and has a hair stylist and makeup artist.

All this from a couple that can't even agree on who owns the team. Jamie McCourt said she is  the team's co-owner, while her husband maintains a marital agreement between  the two gives him sole possession of the Dodgers.  Jamie McCourt says in a sworn declaration that "there was never any  discussion that only Frank owned the Dodgers or that it was his separate  property."

But Frank McCourt says the couple had a practice of dividing their  assets and that she supported that approach to ensure they could be protected  from any creditor claims against himself or the Dodgers. He says the pair signed a marital agreement in March 2004 that gave him  ownership of the Dodgers and that he permitted her to call herself a co-owner  only in the "interests of family harmony."

By his own admission, he said things began to spiral downward once the couple moved from Massachusetts to California after purchasing the Dodgers in 2004.

"I think it was a very _ very comfortable, very nice and very family oriented and we had a lot of nice things," Frank McCourt said in court documents. "I think it became an out-of-control, unsustainable and very uncomfortable lifestyle."

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