In case you haven't been sleeping at night, worrying, you can relax

when was she going to tell us?

Our favorite Belle Haven lesbian/state representative/champion of the poor has settled her divorce

Kasser gets $8 million payment from Bergstein in divorce settlement. He gives up the Jackson Pollock. She resigns from children’s trusts. Former Democratic state senator wanted press banned from trial.

by Kevin Rennie

After nearly four years of acrimony former state Senator Alexandra Kasser and Seth Bergstein have ended their 27-year marriage with a settlement as their trial was beginning. The extended proceedings caused Kasser to abandon public office and Bergstein to be passed over for promotion.

The agreement, dated November 15th, required Bergstein, a Morgan Stanley executive, to “transfer the amount of sight million ($8,000,000) dollars” to Kasser by wire within three (3) days of the execution of their settlement agreement, according to court documents. Bergstein also agreed to release all claims to a Jackson Pollock painting that was the subject of a federal lawsuit commenced by Kasser’s brother, Matthew Mockary. Bergstein did get to keep Kasser’s jewelry in a safe deposit box at a local bank and a safe at their marital home, which Bergstein is also keeping.

Kasser agreed to resign as trustee of trusts established by her family for the couple’s three adult children. The children were often mentioned in the long proceedings of the case.

Kasser (elected in 2018 as Alexandra Bergstein) made much of her marriage and new life with a legislative staffer early in her first term as a state legislator. Kasser set out her stall with a TEDx talk at Wesleyan University, declaring her intention to wage war on privilege and the patrimony. She filed an action seeking a dissolution of marriage on December 28, 2018.

The divorce became the central event of Kasser’s tenure. She announced on May 28, 2019 on Instagram that she had found happiness in a same-sex relationship with Nichola Samporano. Kasser also disclosed she had long been unhappy in her marriage to Bergstein. Kasser’s public comments about her life generally and the details of her marriage and pending divorce gained considerable attention through her own acts, though she blamed Bergstein for raising the profile of the long dispute. Kasser was particularly unhappy with Bergstein’s inclusion of Samporano in some court pleadings. Kasser was re-elected in 2020 and resigned less than six months into her second term, citing the demands of her divorce and the pain of now living in Greenwich caused her.

…

The stakes in the divorce were vividly displayed in a 2021 proposed public relations contract between Bergstein and Sard Verbinnen & Company. Under its terms, Bergstein would pay the firm up to $195,000 to anticipate and respond “to Alex’s attacks in the media” and “shape the narrative in the media without any fingerprints” through the trial.

In preparation for the trial, each party submitted long lists of evidence they intended to introduce. Bergstein’s 18 pages of exhibits included a letter Kasser wrote to each of the couple’s children. Kasser had to sought to bar testimony from the children and other evidence related to them from being introduced at the trial.

The self-proclaimed champion of “Truth, Justice and Democracy” through her own commitment to those fundamental tenets into doubt as the trail was beginning. She moved the Court to ban media coverage of an open courtroom. In her November 14th memorandum, Kasser objected (in bold and underlined) “to any media coverage of this trial and to the inclusion of any press related issues at trial.” Only from the high peak of privilege would a litigant in the Constitution State make such an anti-democratic request.

Some financial documents in the matter are sealed. Nevertheless, Kasser appears to have kept her real estate in the Principality of Monaco, allowing her to take her crusade against privilege and the patriarchy to a second continent–as long as that flat on Rue Garibaldi is not near a train station.