Chad Kroeger performs with Nickelback in Vancouver in June 2010.Jeff Vinnick/The Globe and Mail
A judge has ordered Nickelback frontman Chad Kroeger to pay $25,000 a month to his former common-law wife, more than doubling the spousal support payments the multimillionaire musician was already paying.
The ruling is temporary until the final amount is determined at trial, currently scheduled for August.
Kroeger, 36, and Marianne Goriuk, 40, separated in September 2009 after a relationship that spanned almost seven years. They met at a Nickelback concert in Edmonton in 2002.
Kroeger had been paying Goriuk $10,000 a month, but she argued that wasn't enough, considering the couple's lavish lifestyle during their relationship and Kroeger's annual income of roughly $9.7 million.
She had asked for about $96,000 a month.
Goriuk argued she did daily chores around the couple's Abbotsford, B.C., home, helped oversee the construction and renovations of their home, along with another they bought in Mexico, and travelled with Kroeger on concert tours.
She told the court the couple focused on Kroeger's career and she was "his partner in continued development."
Goriuk also pointed to their lifestyle involving expensive food and wine, flying on private jets to Mexico and elsewhere, taking last-minute helicopter rides into Vancouver and travelling in limousines.
Kroeger, however, insisted Goriuk did not contribute to his successful music career in any way. He also said she was not responsible for cleaning the couple's home, as he had cleaning staff, and was a poor manager of their home renovations.
"The respondent claims the claimant has not shown that she made any contributions to a joint effort of the parties," B.C. Supreme Court Judge Anne MacKenzie wrote in a recent decision.
"Instead, she was only a 'companion' to the respondent. She gave up nothing and gained considerably from the relationship," the judge continued, reciting Kroeger's arguments.
Goriuk submitted a monthly budget of about $25,000, including $3,400 a month in mortgage costs for a home she bought while she was with Kroeger, and more than $5,000 to care for her horses.
Goriuk, who owned a hair salon in Camrose, Alta., when she met Kroeger and has recently started training horses for the film industry, listed an annual income of $12,000. She also wants to pursue training as a construction and interior designer.
MacKenzie ruled Goriuk's budget of $25,000 wasn't unreasonable and she rejected Kroeger's suggestion that his former spouse was living beyond her means.
In fact, MacKenzie described $25,000 a month as "much below the status quo."
"Here, I find the claimant has not submitted an inappropriate 'wish list,"' she wrote.
"Her expenses represent a certain continuation of important and reasonable elements from the parties' previous lifestyle. An interim support order of $25,000 does not amount to a continuation of the lavish lifestyle that the parties enjoyed, including private jets to Mexico and helicopters to Vancouver."
MacKenzie noted the order, which is effective retroactively to May 1, is only for four months.