Divorces aren’t pretty at the best of times, but when you’re looking at what could be the biggest settlement in celebrity history the gloves really come off.

Petra Ecclestone, the daughter of Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone, and her soon to be ex-husband James Stunt are going to war. Less than six years after their lavish R200 million wedding, the battle for their £5,5 billion (R92 billion) has kicked off.

The Daily Mail with the details:

The pair have hired some of the country’s most high profile divorce lawyers to represent them in High Court hearings, which are expected to start next month.

Their £158million mansion in Los Angeles and a Grade II-listed pile in the fashionable London district of Chelsea – worth up to £100million – are expected to just some of the assets fought over.

Extraordinary details of their bitter marriage were laid bare during a highly-charged court hearing yesterday…

Mr Stunt, once rumoured to be worth an estimated £3.3billion, was abusive, violent and took overdoses during his marriage to the glamorous heiress, the court heard.

The businessman [below], who runs an international gold bullion firm, was yesterday accused of behaving in a ‘disgraceful’ and ‘unedifying’ way prior to the hearing…

The bad-tempered hearing boiled over when Mr Stunt, 35, slammed his hand onto a table and appeared to make a ‘gun gesture’ with his hand.

He then pointed at Mr Ecclestone before calling him a ‘c***’ under his breath. Stunt then tapped him on the shoulder and stormed out of the court room.

What a charming bunch of humans.

It’s clear that Stunt isn’t very popular with the folks at the Daily Mail – this passage makes that clear:

Making an obscene gesture at photographers and guzzling in the street from a plastic bottle which clearly did not contain just water, James Stunt was in typically oafish form.

The flabby-jowled, perma-tanned would-be entrepreneur had his hair slicked back and wore a button-up white T-shirt beneath his shiny blue designer suit.

We mentioned that R200 million wedding earlier, so let’s see what you get for spending big:

…Miss Ecclestone walked down the aisle in a £80,000 designer dress at Odescalchi Castle in Rome, where Tom Cruise married Katie Holmes, in front of 350 guests.

Guests were served vintage Louis Roederer Cristal champagne and £4,000-a-bottle Chateau Petrus wine in an air-conditioned white marquee, while acrobats performed beneath hot-air balloons amid the first of the evening’s two fireworks displays.

Eric Clapton, the Black Eyed Peas and DJ David Guetta performed on the night.

Never invite the Black Eyed Peas to perform at your wedding – you’re better than that and they’re a bad omen.

You can find the rest of the dirt dished by the Daily Mail over HERE.

[source:dailymail]