TMZ reported on Tuesday that Sean Avery, defender of bike lanes and general agitator, and his wife, aughts model Hilary Rhoda, have decided to call it quits. Rhoda filed for divorce in Los Angeles this week, citing “irreconcilable differences.”
The former New York Ranger and the former Estée Lauder ambassador were married in 2015 and have been separated since July 17, per the filing. She requested joint legal custody with Avery, but wants physical custody of their two-year-old son, Nash.
Avery was recently in the news for a run-in with the law. He was charged with criminal mischief, a misdemeanor, three years ago, after prosecutors claimed he bashed “sustainable” venture capitalist Jonathan Schulhof and his wife Kimberly Kravis’s minivan with his scooter while three of the couple’s children were in the car (Kravis is the daughter of billionaire Republican donor Henry Kravis).
The charge is a low-level misdemeanor and can usually be resolved with a plea deal and the payment of a fine, but Avery demanded a jury trial and ultimately got a bench trial, in which a judge decides.
When the two-day trial proceedings began last month, Avery had set aside plans to defend himself and hired lawyer Jason Goldman (his first lawyer walked out of the courtroom after Avery announced his self-defending intention during a hearing).
“I’m not a police officer,” Avery said during his testimony, according to The New York Times. “So I didn’t really know if there was a crime committed. It’s part of being on the streets of New York City.”
He was found guilty of criminal mischief and ordered to pay a surcharge anyway.
Rhoda is not a stranger to the courts either. In 2016, Page Six reported that Rhoda had sued her momager, Marianne Rhoda, in federal court two years prior for stealing from her. In a filing, per Page Six, Hilary’s legal team wrote that her mom had “manipulated her familial role to improperly seize—and then abuse—enormous power over Hilary’s finances.” The suit accused her mother of stealing “substantial funds” for everything from her retirement to personal expenses, such as divorce attorneys, a pool vendor, and shopping trips. It was here that how her mother felt about her daughter’s future husband came to light. Hilary suffered “a constant barrage of ad hominem attacks” on Avery following their engagement, which left her “extremely exasperated.”
In a countersuit filed in 2016, Marianne denied the allegations and claimed she was trying to protect her daughter from Avery. The suit claimed that “Avery prevailed upon [Hilary] to refrain from seeking a prenuptial agreement and embarked on a concerted effort to estrange” her from her mom. It said that after Avery left the NHL, his “prospects for employment were highly speculative.” Later that year, Marianne succeeded in getting a temporary restraining order against Avery after she accused him of harassing her in the Hamptons.
TMZ added that Hilary did indicate in the filing that she and Avery had a prenuptial agreement.