Divorce Attorney For Negotiated Divorce Settlements In Queens
Not all marriages are built to last, but it’s also true that some divorces don’t take in the end.
For a family sometimes called the “Royal Family of Rock,” it took nearly a decade to heal old wounds, but Mick Jones, guitarist for the band Foreigner, and Ann Dexter-Jones, a jewelry designer and all-around Renaissance woman, tied the knot for the second time last spring.
Their four-year-long divorce in the 2000s seems to have been difficult for both, but with deep ties to a horde of talented and successful children, their separation was never total.
Ann Dexter-Jones has lived a fairly extraordinary life, if not always a happy one.
As a child in Liverpool, England, her father, Frederick, worked as an eye surgeon, but seems to have been possessed of a certain amount of wanderlust.
When Ann was ten, Frederick called a family meeting where he and Ann’s mother, Judith, told their five children that they weren’t really experiencing the world.
He spun a globe, and when his finger landed on Australia, he announced that they would be moving there.
The family boarded a boat for the journey, but Judith fell ill along the way.
Once they arrived in Australia, she was hospitalized. Frederick realized that he couldn’t tend to his wife and care for the children, so he arranged air transit for them to Scotland, where they could stay with relatives while Judith recovered.
Amazingly, as the flight approached a refueling stop in Singapore, three of its four engines caught fire.
The pilots crash landed the plane on a disused runway, and while many were injured and even killed, the five Dexter children made it through.
When rescuers returned the children to their father in Australia, they learned that their mother had died around the same their doomed flight was crashing.
The experience was deeply scarring, and Frederick spent the next several years moving his family from place to place while Ann, as the oldest child, assumed much of the responsibility for raising her younger siblings.
She attended no fewer than 14 schools across Australia, New Zealand, London, Hampshire, and Westcliffe-on-Sea in England.
Her teen years were rootless, so in 1972 she settled in London and took a job working for the Aga Khan.
She found love in London, as well, and married Laurence Ronson, a music producer and band manager, in the early 1970s.
Through his connections in the music business, she began lifelong friendships with people like Mick Jagger, Yoko Ono, David Bowie, and other luminaries.
The marriage was a happy one for several years, and produced three children, Mark, Samantha, and Charlotte.
Their home was situated just down the road from Paul McCartney’s residence, and the Ronson household quickly became a celebrity hangout, with Robin Williams once tucking Mark into bed, and Keith Moon insisting that the boy get a drum kit.
Eventually, as things sometimes do, the marriage fell apart.
Ann’s primary concern in the divorce was getting custody of the children, and she was anticipating a difficult fight with Laurence, whose family had considerable wealth to allocate to a custody battle.
It was during this time that she first met musician and songwriter Mick Jones, and knew right away that he was the one.
Because of her precarious legal situation at the time, she turned him away to avoid the distraction.
He wasn’t to be deterred though, and sent her orchids every day for six months.
The slow courtship worked, and in 1985, she and Mick married in New York.
Two more children followed, Alexander and Annabelle.
It’s worth digressing a bit to discuss the outstandingly good fortune that Ann’s five children have had in their respective careers.
The family is very close, emotionally and geographically (most of the kids live within a few-block radius of each other and their parents and drop in on each other regularly), and extremely accomplished.
Mark Ronson is a DJ and music producer with a small collection of Grammy Awards, including for his production work for Amy Winehouse and collaborations with Bruno Mars.
His “Uptown Funk,” featuring Mars on vocals, topped the charts in dozens of countries in 2014 and 2015.
His sister Samantha Ronson is also an acclaimed DJ who made headlines a decade ago when she was romantically linked to actress Lindsay Lohan.
Samantha’s twin sister Charlotte is a fashion designer in the city with a flagship store for her eponymous brand on Mulberry Street.
Then there are their half-siblings from their mother’s marriage to Mick.
Alexander is also a DJ, and Annabelle is a model, actress, and director.
The talent and success that the five children have enjoyed is fairly startling, and something for which Ann and Mick are rightly proud.
Their marriage hit hard times in the early 2000s though.
Mick’s drinking had become a problem, and eventually they ended up in a bitter four-year-long divorce that was finalized in 2007.
Ann told London’s Evening Standard of the experience, “I’m not a quitter, but I couldn’t change how things were.”
She said that the split had done real damage, and they hadn’t spoken for a long time after.
By 2010, Mick had gotten sober and was doing the work to mend the fences in their relationship.
The pair were spotted at events around town together over the years, and Ann is usually in the audience when Mick has a performance somewhere.
In 2012, Mick had a scare when a planned heart surgery in Miami became urgent, and Ann, Annabelle, Alexander, and Charlotte were all there for him as he recovered.
Gradually, the king and queen of the Royal Family of Rock were getting to know each other again, and over the last three years or so, were quietly dating.
They didn’t want to raise their children’s hopes, or give their friends anything to gossip about, but in March, they turned up at City Hall and married each other again.
Ann recently listed the duplex she’s lived in since 2008 and moved into Mick’s West Broadway loft.
Sometimes it’s the marriage that fails. For Ann Dexter-Jones and Mick Jones, it was the divorce that didn’t work out.
Hiring A Child Custody And Divorce Lawyer In Queens
If your marriage in Queens is ending, an experienced divorce lawyer can make a big difference for you.
Many people have questions about how judges decide child custody or child support in a Queens divorce case. We can answer all of those questions and more.
Call the team at Zelenitz, Shapiro & D’Agostino today at 718-523-1111 for a free consultation.
