Hollywood star Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt officially divorced in 2019. In 2022, Pitt filed a lawsuit against Jolie for selling their joint winery shares without his consent, alleging a breach of agreement. Despite the ongoing legal battle between them, Jolie recently made a rare plea to Pitt to drop the lawsuit, end the legal war, and bring peace to their family.
In 2016, Jolie accused Pitt of being violent towards her and their children on a private plane, leading to her filing for divorce. Although Pitt was not charged after an investigation into the domestic violence incident, they were still granted a divorce. Subsequently, in 2022, Pitt sued his ex-wife over winery ownership issues.
On July 17, CNN reported that Pitt claimed they had agreed when purchasing the winery that any sale of shares required the other party’s consent. However, in October 2021, Jolie sold her shares to a subsidiary of the Stoli Group controlled by Russian tycoon Yuri Shefler without informing Pitt beforehand.
Amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict at the time, Pitt was concerned about the winery’s commercial reputation being affected, leading him to take legal action and accusing Jolie of “intentional harm”.
However, Jolie’s camp argued that there was no such agreement between them and counter-sued Pitt in April this year. Jolie’s side claimed that Pitt insisted she sign a confidentiality agreement related to “domestic violence secrets” to prevent her from selling winery shares. Pitt’s legal team then requested Jolie to disclose the alleged “confidential agreement”, which the court allowed in May, requiring Jolie to submit the agreement by mid-July.
Jolie and Pitt, who sparked a romance while filming “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” in 2005, got engaged two years later and married in August 2014. However, their marriage showed cracks soon after, leading to separation in 2016 and subsequent divorce proceedings.
Despite announcing their divorce officially in 2019, the lengthy legal battle concluded only in 2023. The settlement at that time granted Jolie full custody of their six children (3 adopted, 3 biological), with Pitt having visitation rights. Pitt retains ownership of their winery and castle in France but was ordered to pay Jolie $250 million in compensation.
While it seemed that Jolie and Pitt’s disputes were calming down, a report by People magazine on April 5 this year revealed Jolie’s new accusations of a history of physical abuse by Pitt, not limited to the well-known in-flight incident and implying a pattern of abuse.
The report mentioned that a source close to Pitt revealed that Jolie’s recent accusations of “domestic violence” were related to their ongoing battle over the winery ownership and suggested that she introduces misleading content to divert public attention whenever decisions unfavorable to her are made.
The battle between Pitt and Jolie over winery property started in February 2022 when Pitt sued Jolie and her former company, Nouvel LLC, alleging the “unlawful” sale of their jointly acquired Miraval shares in 2008. Jolie’s lawyer, Paul Murphy, stated, “Jolie is now asking Mr. Pitt to end the fight and return peace to their family. Unless Mr. Pitt withdraws the lawsuit, Jolie has no choice but to gather necessary evidence to prove his accusations wrong.”