A Los Angeles judge ruled in favor of actor Terrence Howard during a divorce settlement hearing on Monday and overturned a spousal support pact with Howard's second wife, the Associated Press reported. The actor, known for his role as Lucious Lyon in the hit Fox drama "Empire," was reportedly blackmailed by his former wife, Michelle Ghent, for a larger divorce settlement.
"The evidence of extortion or duress was unrebutted," Superior Court Judge Thomas Trent Lewis said, according to the AP.
The former couple will now have to renegotiate terms of a spousal support agreement since Ghent is no longer able to claim a share of Howard's earnings from the wildly popular Fox series "Empire," the Los Angeles Times reported.
Ghent sought to have her $5,800 monthly spousal support payment increased since the show's successful launch, TMZ reported.
Ghent filed for divorce in 2011 after 13 months of marriage and placed a restraining order against Howard, 46, later that year, according to the LA Times. Their split was finalized two years later.
Howard signed a 2012 spousal support agreement after Ghent reportedly threatened to leak footage of the "Empire" star dancing naked in a bathroom and engaged in phone sex with other women, the AP reported. Howard's attorney, Brian Kramer, released a statement that praised Judge Lewis' ruling in favor of his client.
"Today's ruling represents not only a watershed event in the life of Mr. Terrence Howard whose financial livelihood was hanging in the balance," Kramer said in a statement obtained by the AP, "but it's a precedent setting ruling that will have implications for the entire family law bench and bar in California."
