After two
tell-all books, tawdry sex claims, and 3 1/2 years of
living apart, New Jersey's gay ex-governor and his
estranged wife showed up for court Tuesday morning to
begin the process of ending their marriage.
''It's a
beautiful day,'' former governor Jim McGreevey said as he
entered alone through the back entrance of the courthouse.
Dina Matos
McGreevey had no comment when she arrived with her lawyer
through the front courthouse entrance.
The first three
days of the trial will be closed to the media as Union
County superior court judge Karen Cassidy considers custody
issues surrounding the couple's 6-year-old daughter.
The judge has sealed documents and testimony about the
kindergartner, their only child.
McGreevey and his
wife have been going at each other publicly for months
about everything from his partner's financial assets to
their daughter's birthday party.
The issues to be
decided in the divorce settlement involve custody,
alimony, and child support, and whether McGreevey, now
openly gay, committed fraud by marrying a woman.
Matos McGreevey,
41, is seeking $600,000 for time she would have spent at
the governor's mansion had her husband not resigned amid
controversy. McGreevey stepped down during his first
term after a nationally televised speech in which he
acknowledged being ''a gay American'' and having an
affair with a male staffer. The staffer has denied the
affair and said he was sexually harassed by McGreevey.
Since his
resignation in the fall of 2004, both he and his
soon-to-be-ex wrote books about their time together,
including their sex lives. She claims she never knew
he was gay until just before he told the rest of the
world. He claims their marriage was ''a contrivance on both
our parts,'' but that he fulfilled the marriage
contract by providing companionship and a child.
The most
sensational witness could be Teddy Pedersen, a 29-year-old
former aide who claims he had regular three-way sexual
encounters with the McGreeveys beginning when they
were dating in 1999 and ending two years later, after
they were married and McGreevey had been elected
governor.
John Post, a
lawyer representing Matos McGreevey, is seeking to bar
Pedersen's testimony. Matos McGreevey claims the encounters
never happened. McGreevey says they did.
McGreevey, 50,
who now lives with a male partner and is studying to be an
Episcopal priest, wants joint physical and legal custody of
their daughter. He currently has the child one night a
week and every other weekend.
Child support
payments will depend on custody arrangements, lawyers have
said. (Angela Delli Santi, AP)
