Agreement said the tapes should never see the light of day

Jul 20, 2010 09:06 GMT  ·  By
Oksana Grigorieva was offered $15 million after the split from Mel Gibson and turned the offer down, says report
   Oksana Grigorieva was offered $15 million after the split from Mel Gibson and turned the offer down, says report

Mel Gibson and Oksana Grigorieva split in April this year, after dating for approximately one year and becoming parents to a baby girl they named Lucia. Initially, it was believed that the split had been amicable, since the two had agreed on all matters that might have been a source of problems between them, from custody rights to financial arrangements. Under said contract, which was soon broken, Oksana would have gotten no less than $15 million, TMZ reports.

Ever since the scandal broke, camp Gibson has insisted that the actor and director had promised to take good care of his ex and his daughter, including paying their expenses and offering Oksana a house, a car and alimony. All this would have totaled about $15 million and the only condition was, according to sources, to have the tapes Oksana had made during her conversations with Mel go away. Initially, the Russian singer accepted – but soon had a change of heart about the agreement and she walked away from it.

Then the tapes were released, which would more than justify a conclusion that she may have had a hand in their “leaking” online, regardless of how much she denies it. “Sources tell TMZ, during the child custody mediation in May, lawyers for Mel and Oksana worked out a financial deal for Oksana – she would get a total of $15 mil, which included child support, a house and other assets. But sources intimately familiar with the mediation tell us Oksana promised something in return – that all ‘evidence’ associated with the case remain confidential. We’ve learned the ‘evidence’ includes the tapes. Oksana’s lawyers had played some, but not all of the tapes for Mel’s lawyers,” TMZ writes.

“Oksana and Mel both signed a ‘short form agreement’ – a bare-bones contract outlining the broad strokes of the deal. The lawyers then drafted a long form agreement which contained specifics of the deal, but we’re told Oksana refused to sign the long form, claiming she felt coerced. We’re told Mel never paid Oksana under the deal because the short form didn’t spell out the specifics of payment and Oksana refused to sign the longer agreement which contained the details,” the e-zine further says.

Sources claim that, though the word “tapes” was not once pronounced during talks, all parties involved understood that they should never become public. Afterwards, Oksana refused to put her name on the dotted line of the longer contract – and in almost no time the tapes were out, making the rounds online and delivering quite a serious blow to Gibson’s credibility and reputation.

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