An divorced mother from New York’s upper crust East Side, may have just learnt that sikence is golden. Years of trashing her ex-husband took a toll as she drifts dangerously towrds losing her entire divorce settlement.
An appeals court has further slashed the $855,000 payout to Janice Schacter, finding that her blabbing about her lawyer-ex’s Playmate girlfriend damaged his business during an economic downturn.
Lower court Judge Laura Drager had already slashed Schacter’s award from $2.5 million in 2014, reasoning that “the wife chose to bite the hand that fed her” by talking to the press about her estranged husband’s escapades.
Schacter had gone public with claims that her ex, Cadawalader, Wickersham & Taft partner Ira Schacter, bought the Playboy model a $215,000 diamond engagement ring while refusing to pay for his daughter’s $12,000 hearing aids.
Ira Schacter said at the time, “I love my daughter dearly,” but his attorney insisted he didn’t have to pay her medical bills unless he gave prior approval for the care.
The attorney argued that his wife’s behavior sullied his reputation and caused him to lose clients.|
Indeed Ira Schacter, 57, earned the dubious distinction of “A—hole Lawyer of the Month” in 2011 at the website Above the Law.
“Her repeated attacks against him have played a part in diminishing his income,” Judge Drager found.

In 2014 Janice Schacter ws told she would only get 17% of the value of her ex-husband’s partnership because their very public divorce battle hurt his business.

Janice Schacter, 54, had said she was due half the value of her husband’s $5 million partnership at the white-shoe law firm in 2007.
But Drager gave her just 17 percent, after slashing the majority of her share for bad behavior.
Now Manhattan’s appellate division has ruled that Drager should have used a 2012 valuation for the firm, which was just $1.6 million due to the “financial crisis” and the “negative publicity” generated by the wife’s claims.
The appeals panel ordered a new trial to determine a revised divorce payment to Janice Schacter based on the $1.6 million valuation from 2012, not the $5 million valuation from 2007.
Ira Schacter declined to comment, but Thomas Shanahan, his ex-wife’s lawyer, blasted the ruling.
“This is a very disturbing decision,” Shanahan said.
“I think it’s going to have a chilling effect, especially on women, to be silent,” he added.
Shanahan said his client gave up her own legal career to raise the couple’s two children and is now going to walk away with “almost nothing.”
After the 2014 ruling, a miffed Janice blasted the Judge’s decision.
“I bit the hand the hurt me, not fed me,” Janice, said at the time, as she pointed out that he was that he was still handling billion dollar deals, inspite of her so called malicious gossip.
She noted that her ex has worked on “at least two, billion dollar deals that Cadwalader has issued press releases with his name on them.
“Would Cadwalader issue a press release with his name if he was toxic?” Janice asked.
She was also awarded half of the former couple’s $10.5 million in other marital assets including proceeds from the sales of a $4.4 million Manhattan townhouse, a $4.5 million Bridgehampton summer home and $400,000 worth of jewelry.
Finally she’ll get up to $21,000 a month in spousal and child support plus the family Lexus.