Lionel Bissoon and Elizabeth Johnson with baby WilliamBy Tom Leonard in New York
29/03/2008
The flamboyant and privileged lifestyle of one of America's richest heiresses has been laid bare in a custody battle she is fighting over a Cambodian orphan.
Elizabeth "Libet" Johnson, 57, an heir to the £85 billion Johnson & Johnson pharmaceuticals empire, has been portrayed by a former boyfriend as ruthless, deceitful and predatory, using her enormous wealth to get her way.
The less than flattering portrait of a Manhattan socialite who once owned a 20,000sq ft apartment on Central Park has been provided by Lionel Bissoon, a Trinidadian-born celebrity weight-loss doctor with whom she was romantically involved.
The pair have been fighting for nearly three years over a five-year-old Cambodian boy whom both claim to have legally adopted, with the case leading to accusations of "legal kidnapping" and extortion.
This week, in Manhattan's state appeals court, Miss Johnson appealed against a judge's decision to revoke her previous judgment in the multi-millionaire socialite's favour.
Miss Johnson, whose grandfather, Robert Wood Johnson built his company into a pharmaceutical giant, has remained silent outside court, but Dr Bissoon, 47, has been happy to highlight her alleged faults.
He has pointed out how she had five husbands before she was 40 and claimed she has been romantically linked with many other men, including the singer Michael Bolton and the hairdresser Frederic Fekkai.
Dr Bissoon, who wrote The Cellulite Cure, became romantically involved with Miss Johnson in 2003. At the time, she was one of his patients. He says she began inviting him to her apartment in the Trump International Hotel and Tower.
Valued at one point at £31 million, the property was so big that she had considered installing a basketball court and a pool.
Dr Bissoon admitted that life with her had its attractions - jetting in her private plane between her various homes, including one in the ski resort of Vail and her farm in Millbrook, upstate New York.
Within months they were talking about adoption and, later that year, Miss Johnson found an orphan called Rath Chan in Cambodia, where she was involved in setting up an orphanage.
Temporarily getting round a US ban on adopting Cambodians, they brought the boy to New York on a medical visa in August 2003. He was given a £50,000 trust fund and two nannies, and installed at the Johnson apartment. However, by the following summer, the Bissoon-Johnson relationship was virtually over.
Miss Johnson, who has four grown-up children, told him that she intended to adopt the child on her own. Mr Bissoon initially agreed but changed his mind after the heiress banned him from seeing William following a row at her apartment.
Two years ago, a judge named Miss Johnson as the child's mother but revoked her order last year, citing the heiress's "substantial, material misrepresentations".
The judge was unimpressed to learn belatedly that Miss Johnson had failed to disclose that she had originally tried to adopt the boy with Dr Bissoon, and that he had actually adopted William first, in Cambodia in 2004.
Miss Johnson had also not disclosed that she had recently been treated for a drinking problem.
The four-judge panel has reserved its judgment.
29/03/2008
The flamboyant and privileged lifestyle of one of America's richest heiresses has been laid bare in a custody battle she is fighting over a Cambodian orphan.
Elizabeth "Libet" Johnson, 57, an heir to the £85 billion Johnson & Johnson pharmaceuticals empire, has been portrayed by a former boyfriend as ruthless, deceitful and predatory, using her enormous wealth to get her way.
The less than flattering portrait of a Manhattan socialite who once owned a 20,000sq ft apartment on Central Park has been provided by Lionel Bissoon, a Trinidadian-born celebrity weight-loss doctor with whom she was romantically involved.
The pair have been fighting for nearly three years over a five-year-old Cambodian boy whom both claim to have legally adopted, with the case leading to accusations of "legal kidnapping" and extortion.
This week, in Manhattan's state appeals court, Miss Johnson appealed against a judge's decision to revoke her previous judgment in the multi-millionaire socialite's favour.
Miss Johnson, whose grandfather, Robert Wood Johnson built his company into a pharmaceutical giant, has remained silent outside court, but Dr Bissoon, 47, has been happy to highlight her alleged faults.
He has pointed out how she had five husbands before she was 40 and claimed she has been romantically linked with many other men, including the singer Michael Bolton and the hairdresser Frederic Fekkai.
Dr Bissoon, who wrote The Cellulite Cure, became romantically involved with Miss Johnson in 2003. At the time, she was one of his patients. He says she began inviting him to her apartment in the Trump International Hotel and Tower.
Valued at one point at £31 million, the property was so big that she had considered installing a basketball court and a pool.
Dr Bissoon admitted that life with her had its attractions - jetting in her private plane between her various homes, including one in the ski resort of Vail and her farm in Millbrook, upstate New York.
Within months they were talking about adoption and, later that year, Miss Johnson found an orphan called Rath Chan in Cambodia, where she was involved in setting up an orphanage.
Temporarily getting round a US ban on adopting Cambodians, they brought the boy to New York on a medical visa in August 2003. He was given a £50,000 trust fund and two nannies, and installed at the Johnson apartment. However, by the following summer, the Bissoon-Johnson relationship was virtually over.
Miss Johnson, who has four grown-up children, told him that she intended to adopt the child on her own. Mr Bissoon initially agreed but changed his mind after the heiress banned him from seeing William following a row at her apartment.
Two years ago, a judge named Miss Johnson as the child's mother but revoked her order last year, citing the heiress's "substantial, material misrepresentations".
The judge was unimpressed to learn belatedly that Miss Johnson had failed to disclose that she had originally tried to adopt the boy with Dr Bissoon, and that he had actually adopted William first, in Cambodia in 2004.
Miss Johnson had also not disclosed that she had recently been treated for a drinking problem.
The four-judge panel has reserved its judgment.
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