by Melinda Pillsbury- Foster
Wendy and
Alex met for the first time on April 17, 1992 at The Crazy Horse
Restaurant and Night Club in Orange County. Alex saw her standing in
line and came up to her and gave her his heavily gold embossed card
with his title and, although she hesitated, she gave him her phone
number. At the time, Wendy was 24 and had been working for eight
years. She found her first job when she was 16 and still in high
school. By working she earned enough money to buy a car and begin
saving until she graduated. She was hired at age 20 as a
receptionist at a prestigious law firm in Orange County.
She has
worked nearly continuously and is highly valued at the firm as a
reliable and dedicated employee. This was likely a large part of the
draw for Alex. Wendy was attractive and her job brought in an
income. She was steady and reliable and had an apartment and a car,
all things Alex lacked – and best of all she was an American
citizen.
Alex called
her persistently asking her to go out with him. At the time he was
sofa surfing at the home of Richard
Gipe. This arrangement proved to be wearing for Alex's host and the
Viscount found himself in need of alternate resources.
Because
he had lost access to the car he was borrowing from Gipe's girl
friend, Alex suggested he drive her to work, freeing Wendy's car for
his use. Wendy reluctantly agreed. She had
just finished paying off the vehicle to lower her expenses while she
was off work.
By
July, Alex had moved into Wendy's apartment, rapidly displacing her
room mate with his behavior. Wendy had discovered she was pregnant
and was not sure getting married
right
away
was
a good idea.
In
March, 1993
Alex totaled her modest 1987
Nissan Sentra
and insisted on 'buying her' a Jaguar, going out to choose it
alone. This
did not strike Wendy as an appropriate vehicle, but Alex ignored her
objections.
On
May 7th
Alex came home and insisted they be married immediately. Two hours
later they were standing in front of a Justice of the Peace. Wendy
had been planning a wedding after the baby was born and no one in her
family was able to attend on only a few minutes notice. The ceremony
took place at
the Court House at 211 W. Santa Ana Blvd., Santa Ana, 92701 Orange
County, California. A business
associate
of Alex’s, John McDonald, acted as witness.
Wendy
was told the emergency wedding was needed to avoid Alex being
deported, but
refused to tell her why.
Montagu
– Buford MarriageCertificate
Their
son, Alexander Michael Charles David Drogo Montagu, Alexander
Junior,was born on the 13th.
As
soon as she was home from the hospital Alex insisted they visit the
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Field Office at 300 North
Los Angeles St. Los Angeles, CA, and later an attorney's office in
the Los Angeles area.
Alex
was finally forced to come clean and tell Wendy he had written a bad
check for the Jaguar. Wendy was forced to borrow from her 401K
to cover his bad check. This proved to only the first of many
such incidents. At the time, Wendy was on maternity leave from her
work.
Not
long after giving birth to their son, Alexander, Jr., Alex started
parking the new Jag in the garage at their apartment. Alex
knew, but Wendy did not, that “Cove Motoring” was trying to
repossess the Jaguar until they came to the front door one night
demanding the car. Eventually, the car went missing,
turning up, torched, in the desert. Wendy has always believed Alex
did this himself.
 |
| Jaguar |
Looking
at cars was a major focus for Alex, far more than finding, or
keeping, a job.
1994
marked the
first of the five jobs held by Montagu
during his second marriage. He was hired to drive the shuttle for
Wyndham
Hotel in Costa Mesa
late that year.
The
couple
lived
within walking distance. Alex,
Jr.
was less than a year old and Wendy was working full time and taking
care of the
household when she came home. This job lasted about a month,
according to Wendy,
who remembers he was excited about the tips. She also noted losing
this
job,
or any of his subsequent jobs, was just was not his fault.
Montagu's second job lasted two weeks in 1995. This involved scraping barnacles off boats in Newport Harbor. Wendy had to drop him off and pick him up. There was no explanation as to why this job ended.
Wendy
gave in to Alex's demand he, as the husband, control the money early
in the marriage. This proved to be a devastating mistake which
resulted in nearly yearly evictions from a constant series of homes.
During the time they were together, 13 years, the couple was evicted
twelve times.
This
has also been true of Manchester's life during his third marriage and
to present day.
Not
mentioning inconvenient facts to Wendy was standard operating
procedure throughout the marriage. In 1996 Manchester's mother, Lady
Mary Montagu, finally persuaded Alex to cooperate in filling out the
forms for a divorce from Marion Stoner Montagu, to whom he was still
legally married.
Wendy
remembered Lady Mary calling but was never told why there was a
sudden, and temporary, increase in communication.
1996
Divorce from Stoner
August
September
27 -Alex,
at the insistence of his mother, Lady Mary Montagu, agrees to
cooperate
in a divorce from his first wife, Marion Stoner Montagu. He has
been bigamously married
to Wendy Buford Montagu for over three years.
Although ordered to do
so by his mother Alex does not repair matters and
remarry
Wendy.
October
28 - Divorce becomes
absolute
One
of the few times Wendy remembers with happiness from her marriage,
except for her children, was meeting Michael Jackson. Manchester
routinely received invitations for official events from the British
Embassy so the couple received one for the memorial service for
Diana, Princess of Wales to be held in Los Angeles in September,
1997.
A
mutual acquaintance, who knew Jackson was trying to find a way to
attend the event, arranged for Michael to attend as their guest. So
on September 13th
the Viscount of Mandeville and Wendy, the Viscountess, rolled up to
the
St. James Episcopal Church in Los Angeles with Michael Jackson.
After the service Michael returned with them to their hotel room and
visited with Alex, Jr. Lord Alex spent his time videoing the game of
hide and go seek which took place in their room at Hyatt Regency.
Alex
immediately tried to sell Michael a plane, for which he hoped to
receive a hefty commission. Jackson declined, but the star did
invite the entire family to spend the day at Neverland on Martin
Luther King Day the next January.
On
June 16th
1999 the Montagu's second child, a daughter, named Ashley Faith
Maxine Nell Beatrice Montagu, was born.
Alex
had been asking Wendy to have more children but she felt they should
have some stability before enlarging their family. Montagu's motive
was monetary. For every child he received an additional monthly
stipend from the Manchester Trust. Wendy never knew what Alex did
with the money provided by the Trust, which Alex refused to discuss
with her.
This
same year Montagu found a third job, this one driving a limo
for a company whose name
was
something like “Five Star Limo,” according to Wendy. This job
ended after less than a month when Alex
ran
over someone's foot.
On
July 25th,
2002 Alex succeeded to his father's title, becoming the 13th
Duke of Manchester,
16th
Baron Kimbolton of
Kimbolton.
Alex made one trip to England, alone. Otherwise, nothing changed.
In
2003 Wendy bought a car of her own car so she could be sure of having
transportation. It is paid for and she is still driving it
today.
Earlier,
this same year Montagu found a fourth job. The family was living in
Irvine.
Alex became a security guard for Nordic
Security
and was allowed to drive a patrol car wearing
a standard uniform. Excited by this, he became very wrapped up in the
job. According to Wendy, Alex decided he was actually a police
officer, buying extra uniforms in addition to a pair of handcuffs.
Deciding
he needed practice using his handcuffs he clamped them on Wendy's
wrists one evening, dragged her down the hallway,
bruising her badly during a disagreement. He lost the job because of
an altercation
while on patrol at a movie complex area in Lake Forest. During
the altercation he was slightly injured.
The
altercation was with a woman manager at the movie theater and the
manager's boyfriend. Alex did not confide any further details with
Wendy except to say he needed to break up a fight and was shoved and
hurt on the job. His employment ended a short time later, the entire
time of employment being about one month.
This
resulted in a claim for workman's compensation which produced
enough money the next year to pay for a colon
reduction to help him reduce his growing weight.
The
surgery took place at Tri-City
Regional Medical Center.
He
had told Wendy, who drove him, he was going in for an operation on
his back. But the nurse turned to Wendy, giving her instructions for
afterward for a very different part of the anatomy as Alex tried with
his hands to signal the nurse to be quiet.
In
early 2005 Michael Jackson, briefly, reentered their lives.
On
March 25, 2005, Wendy began receiving calls from friends telling her
Alex was on television, in fact, being interviewed on NBC News by
Mike
Taibbi. It had dawned on Alex he would be only one of two litigants
in the case against Jackson instead of one of many. He also probably
realized Wendy would not lie and could think of no way to keep her
off the witness stand.
Alex,
therefore, needed an excuse not to testify.
Wendy's
friends asked her about the claims Alex was making, including being
threatened by Jackson, being told to stay away from the trial, and
his car and house being vandalized. Wendy told them she was not
aware of any threats and knew, for a fact, the house and car were not
damaged.
But
on April 20th
a
Declaration
made by Alexander, Duke of Manchester, on the abuse of
his
son by Jackson was entered into the court record. No such abuse had
taken place, and could not have, according to Wendy because Michael
was never alone with Little Alex.
Life
with Alex included the unexpected in many ways. In September or
October of 2005 Alex announced he was going to England on important
business with the Manchester Trustees. Wendy, always the dutiful
wife, drove him to the airport having been told he would be gone a
week. Left to arrange transportation for the kids to school and then
care until she was home from work, her hands were full. Alex always
left abruptly and Wendy eventually realized she really had no idea
where he had gone.
Alex
called her constantly. Later, Wendy began to understand he was
checking up on her because he knew what he would do if left alone.
So the calls began even before she was home from dropping him off at
LAX. “Do you miss me?” he asked. Wendy responded she never had
a chance to miss him.
On
this occasion Wendy found out Alex was not in England through Norman
Parker, a family friend who called one night to tell her he had
talked to Alex in Nassau. Norman realized from her response this was
news to her and attempted to cover for Alex, but it did not work.
Next
time she and Alex talked she asked where he was. He lied, getting
off the phone abruptly.
Finally
home after a month he began unpacking his suit cases, one more than
he had left with, to give the kids trinkets from his trip.
Fed
up and angry, that afternoon Wendy began emptying the suit cases so
she could do the wash. She found tee-shirts from Thailand and a
package of condoms with two missing.
Confronted
him about the condoms, he smirked. He liked it when he thought she
was jealous. She she was asking herself, “Who is this man?”
Alex
tried to tell her this was just his friends messing around. Noticing
his passport, she grabbed in. She could see he had been to Russia,
Nassau, and Thailand.
Outraged,
she demanded answers to be told he can't tell her because he is
working for the FBI. This, she does not believe. She tells him he
is living in fantasy world. He tells her they were using him
because he is so stupid. That, she could see, had the ring of truth.
Later,
when Alex was threatening her with death by government assassination
she called the FBI to be told they do not get involved in custody
disputes and divorces. Alex would continue to tell people about his
contacts at the FBI.
In
November of 2005 Alex began training for what was to be his longest
job, working at Disneyland on the Indiana Jones Ride, a far reach
from being Mr. CIA Man.
Initially,
Alex loved the work and made friends, occasionally having drinks
after work. But evidently this also meant he did not have the money
to pay the mortgage on the house they had finally managed to
buy.
After
the family was evicted from their twelfth home in 13 years in Aliso
Viejo the family moved to Laguna Nigel. This occurred
around
Valentine's day, 2006 while Alex was still working at Disneyland.
Wendy
said there might have been a short stint at MacDonald on the fry
machine, but no other real jobs. But
this did not mean Alex was not occupied. During the summer of 2006
Alex joined a dating site where he met Laura Ann Smith who he would
marry the next year, several days after his divorce from Wendy was
final.
It
was during this period that Alex received the largest bounty he would
ever get from the Manchester Trust, a share in the sale of the
Manchester Jewels. Wendy would learn of this in court when Alex's
bank records, which he thought he had adequately hidden, were
produced for him to explain.
Early
in December, 2006, legal separation documents are served on Wendy.
This was news to Wendy, as Alex was still living together as man and
wife on Prescott Street, Aliso Viejo, CA. The papers had been
issued 16th November 2006.
The
Nightmare of the Divorce from Hell had begun.
Christmas
2006 was more like a bad horror movie than a celebration, though
Wendy says every Christmas was similar.
After
being served paperwork for a separation, Wendy tried to keep the
holidays as normal and seamless as possible because she did not want
Christmas ruined for the children. For years Wendy had tried to
have celebrations which included her mother and father but by 2006
Alex had finally succeeded in alienating her from her family.
Alex's
behavior had shocked and disgusted both of Wendy's parents.
Coping
with Alex's dramas, which were always worse on holidays, became
impossible, so Christmas became just the 4 of them.
That Christmas
Day Alex was wandering around like a zombie, according to Wendy. At
the time he was using an enormous amount of sleeping pills to, he
said, cope with the painful memories of holidays he did not spend
with his birth family. Every year these serially repeated
recollections would ruin Christmas Day.
After
13 years of attempting to rectify this early deprivation by providing
him an environment of family, friends and holiday traditions, Wendy
thought he could have moved on from his childhood. There were new
holiday traditions, children, and new memories to make with his own
family. But, no, it always had to be about him, no matter what
the cost to his wife or children.
That
year Alex spent Christmas Day sleeping off and on, and stumbling
through the house naked. By the time dinner was ready and Wendy
sat down with the children, they were still trying to wake him up to
join them for dinner.
Exhausted
mentally and physically, Wendy remembered saying to herself, “I
will not spend another Christmas like this again.” She had no idea
she was going to get her wish. This would actually be their final
Christmas together.
As
she and the children began to eat Wendy apologized to the both of the
kids for how the day had gone.
Alexander,
Jr. said to her, “why mom, it’s not your fault dinner is
ruined”. Wendy choked down her supper with an enormous lump
in her throat. But January was even worse.
On
January
5th
Alex made a call to Wendy's workplace, informing the receptionist he
had issued a restraining order against her. This was followed up with
a call from the sheriffs’ department that this action had been
filed and she
would be required to appear in court and answer to these charges.
Wendy
was stunned to learn Alex was claiming she had chased him around the
house with a knife. Immediately, Wendy complied with every
thing the court asked her to do. She was evaluated by court
appointed counselors to determine
if she was a fit mother. It was determined that she could have
unsupervised
visitations with the children during the divorce proceedings but Alex
refused to comply with the instructions of the court, himself. For
months Wendy barely saw her children and all of the exchanges with
the children were at the police station.
Wendy
was left with only the possessions in her purse when she left for
work on January 5th.
Her heritage china and crystal, her mementos from friends, family,
and school were never returned to her or was her jewelry, most of it
gifts from her mother and grandmother and valuable.
Living
in a starkly unfurnished apartment Wendy thought of nothing but her
children. Turning to her parents and family for support, she knew
she could never go back to Alex, no matter what. During this time
she endured bizarre emails from Alex, who she found was lying about
her to everyone they knew and to the new acquaintances he was making.
At the same time, he was attempting to get her to go back to him and
realized this whole scenario was an attempt on his part of control
her even more completely than he already did.
The
Judge, having heard all the reports from the CPS evaluator and
psychologist
awarded physical custody to Wendy. CPS
indicated that they had observed one of the worst cases of Parental
Alienation they
had seen.
On
August 23 Alex was stripped of physical custody. He turned the
children over to Wendy in their pajamas. They were permitted to
bring nothing they owned with them. On the 30th
of August the marriage between Wendy and Alex Montagu was dissolved,
with some issues
reserved.
Although
Alex, who the court discovered had nearly a million dollars in the
bank, was ordered to pay for court costs. He was also ordered to pay
both alimony and child support. This was accomplished by the
Manchester Trust sending the funds directly to Wendy for herself and
the children.
Alex,
now single, was featured in an article titled,
TheDuke of Hazard. To the public he
was a celebrity playboy.
Three weeks later, on September 21,
Alex
married Laura Ann Smith, a spinster in her 40s whose father was a
farmer in Michigan, where she grew up.
Visitation
was a nightmare. All exchanges took place at the police station
until Alex left the state. The reserved issues were heard on
September 15,
2008.
- Judgment for Reserved Issues - Montagu v Montagu, Case No. 06D010327, Honorable Judge Mark S. Millard, Presiding. Reporter's Transcript of Judge's Ruling .
The
next year, on June 5th,
Wendy received a call from Alex that he had still been married to
Marion Stoner at the time of their wedding in 1993. Their union was
not legal and he had so informed the Manchester Trust.
The
Trust was forced to suspend their payments because of Alex's
confession
to them of his bigamy.
The
next two years were a financial disaster for Wendy and the children.
But the Manchester Trust filed a suit to be heard in the High Court
of the Chancery, London, on the issue of the children's legitimacy.
On July 19, 2011 support for the children was restored. The court
had found they had rights as beneficiaries.
The
news media erupted with articles on the bigamist duke and his three
wives, something Alex had evidently not anticipated. In complete
consistency with his previous behavior Alex now denied having
informed the Manchester Trusts and also that he had ever been
married to Marion Stoner Montagu.
The
children never saw their father again, though occasionally he would
call them, attempting to manipulate them, issue threats and disparage
their mother.
Wendy
calls it the marriage, or unmarriage, from Hell.
