Those “sources” who are always close to Kobe and Vanessa Bryant apparently need to get their stories straight. Earlier this month, it was reported that as part of the couple's pending divorce, the soon-to-be-former Mrs. would get two of three properties Black Mamba owns in Newport Coast: one with a mansion the family lived in, one with a mansion her mom lives in and one with a recently built giant estate. Five days ago, it was reported all over the Interwebs that Kobe's moving back into the family abode and Vanessa's taking the new pad. Today it's reported she's getting all three properties.
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“Sources close to the couple” say a settlement has already been finalized giving her the properties and $75 million, or half of the NBA superstar's fortune, TMZ reports.
She filed for divorce in December, citing “irreconcilable differences.” Tabloid reports soon came out alleging Kobe had been unfaithful throughout their 10-year marriage, banging about 10 different women every year. Philandering is costing him as Vanessa never signed a pre-nup.
Whatever she's truly walking away with, you've got to give her this: the former Vanessa Laine has experienced many major life changes before her 30th birthday
this May. She was still a 17-year-old senior at Marina High School in Huntington Beach when she met her future husband while working as a background dancer on Tha Eastsidaz music video “G'd
Up.” They married six months later in Dana Point, bought their first
home on a quiet Newport Coast cul de sac for $4 million in 2002 and went on to have two daughters while living there.
In the summer of 2003 there was, of course, Kobe's misadventures in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, that resulted in his apologizing to
his wife with a $4 million, eight-carat, purple-diamond ring.
Without the sources close to them around, the Bryants have released a joint statement saying they have resolved all issues privately, with the assistance of counsel. Court documents show they will share joint legal and physical custody of Natalia, 8, and Gianna, 5. Soon after Vanessa filed her divorce petition, Kobe shot back with a response agreeing to pay her spousal support. Hopefully those close to him will provide the correct address to send the checks.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.