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Creditors demand Serena Williams’ crumbling childhood home is sold in new court filing after stepmom’s $620k debt on it
Court documents revealed shocking truths about the marriage
SERENA Williams' childhood home looks doomed after her stepmom racked up $620,000 in debt on it - now creditors are demanding their money back.
Lakeisha Graham’s desperate attempt to keep hold of the family home looks in vain - as her main creditor is demanding the sale to pay back her colossal debt.
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The property is worth $1.4 million and has been in the Williams family since 1995 when the tennis star’s father Richard purchased it with Serena’s mom Oracene for $355,000.
But former stripper Lakeisha faked Richard’s signature on the title deeds to transfer the four-bedroom mansion in Palm Beach, Florida, into her name - and then took out a $279,000 loan from “hard lender” David Simon, which she blew on a failed trucking business.
The debt at one point reached $620,000, including legal fees and interest, but Lakeisha has since then repaid some of it - and it’s now thought to be around half a million.
She’s tried three times to file for Chapter 13 bankruptcy protection, and the last bid was thrown out when she failed to keep up with a repayment plan.
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Now Simon has sent a notice to the judge involved in his lawsuit, which states that the latest bankruptcy has failed.
This means that Lakeisha will lose court protection - which stopped the property from being foreclosed - with Simon gaining most of the monies from the sale and the rest being split by more than 20 other creditors.
But there is one sliver of hope - there’s currently nothing to stop her from immediately filing for Chapter 13 again, but this would add on more in legal and court costs.
She’d also have to prove that her situation has changed and can afford to keep up with a repayment plan.
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If Lakeisha refiles, her automatic stay - protection from creditors - will only last 30 days.
Yet increasing costs and more legal wrangling don’t seem to fear the 45-year-old, who is almost half the age of legendary tennis coach Richard, 81.
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"King" Richard, who’s suffered two strokes and dementia, filed for divorce after allegedly realizing that his house had been “stolen” - although that was recently dismissed from court, as speculation mounts whether the pair are back together.
In Simon's deposition, he revealed Lakeisha approached him initially for a loan after seeing a “for sale" sign on his $79,000 Volvo semi truck tractor.
Simon testified he would only sell the truck to Lakeisha if he had property as collateral, which was in Richard's name, so Lakeisha allegedly transferred the deeds into her name by faking her husband's signature. She then borrowed further amounts.
But the truck was repossessed by Simon in June 2018 after it split in half in Long Island City, 1,200 miles from their home, causing $30,000 damage.
Richard and Lakeisha's Divorce Timeline
Photo credit: Getty
Richard Williams has been keen to finalize his divorce from Lakeisha Graham for years but their case has dragged out amid a fight over their marital home.
The couple married in 2010 when Lakeisha was 32 and Richard was 69.
Williams is a hands-on father to their young son, Dylan, known as Junior, and has tried to maintain a good relationship with his ex despite the court case.
May 2017
- Richard filed for divorce from Lakeisha after seven years of marriage. He claimed in his initial petition that she had forged his name on a deed transfer for their home and stole his Social Security checks.
March 2020
- Court documents revealed excerpts from Lakeisha's testimony, in which she admits to forging her ex's signature and also selling his 1999 Bluebird Wanderlodge Motor Coach, worth $45,000. But she claimed she did so as he had left her and their son to starve, which his legal team denied.
February 2022
- Lakeisha told a judge that her stepdaughter Serena wanted to lock her out of the family home. She claimed a letter from the tennis star's lawyers "threatened to change the locks" if she did not vacate the property. Her legal team at the time did not respond to requests for comment.
June 2022
- Richard filed a $1 million lawsuit against Lakeisha, despite her claiming in court documents they had reconciled and had been sleeping together again, which he later denied.
July 2022
- Their home was valued at $1.45 million and was due to be auctioned off, but Lakeisha filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy and stalled the sale. The bankruptcy case was dismissed on July 5 but she filed to have it reinstated claiming she had found money for a repayment plan. She was in hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt after taking out a huge loan from a hard lender and not paying it back.
January 2023
- The U.S. Sun sat down with Richard for a world-exclusive interview in which he accused ex-stripper Lakeisha of "taking everything" and blowing his cash. Asked how he feels about the split, he said, "I just want a divorce. It's been six years, man. Just a bunch of junk, junk, junk. [I'm] so tired of that junk now." But he didn't seem to be getting any closer to finalizing it and his lawsuit was tossed out by a judge.
August 2023
- It was revealed Lakeisha was struggling to keep up with her repayment plan as she battled to keep the house, where she was said to be living despite it needing extensive repair work.
April 2024
- Richard missed a court date and deposition as he suffers from speech problems due to strokes, and didn't want to be misunderstood. As a result, he had the case dismissed but plans to refile. Lakeisha has tried for months to stave off the house being sold at auction by filing for Chapter 13 bankruptcy three times, but each attempt has failed. The pair's divorce is expected to resume and play out for months as she continues to live in the rundown home.
The case, which has been ongoing since April 2017, revealed jaw-dropping allegations about Lakeisha and Richard’s tumultuous marriage.
Court docs from Lakeisha’s deposition showed that she'd forged Richard's signature once before, so that she could sell his 1999 Bluebird Wanderlodge Motor Coach, worth $45,000, to buy food for herself and their son Dylan, now 8.
"Mainly, I was broke by my husband [who] did not help me. It was my son and I not getting any money, so I had to sell it so I can eat and my son can eat… we didn’t have anything," she said.
She claimed to have no inkling that Richard wanted a divorce, saying they were living together as a married couple until May 2017 when he suddenly served her “dissolution papers."
She reveals that on the day he filed the divorce petition, he even gave her a kiss and prayed with her in the morning.
"He just came and gave me a kiss actually that morning, the morning of — and he will always, would share with me to pray, you know, to always pray for our family and then he left with Chavoita,” she said in her deposition.
In his divorce petition, Richard accused Lakeisha of stealing his social security checks and forging his signature to take ownership of numerous vehicles.
Richard’s son Chavoita Lesane has threatened for the last year to file an elder abuse suit, which is yet to materialize.
He told The U.S. Sun in an exclusive interview, "I can't remember how long it was into the relationship as far as my dad starting to have financial headaches, like, 'What's going on with my social security checks?'
"Lakeisha took the Mercedes, she took the bus, she took money, what else was it? The motorcycle.
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"There are so many things that she stole or forged documents for him. That's considered elder abuse.
"We're just putting all of it together, it's a lot. This whole situation has been frustrating.”
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