RHOBH What did Erika Jayne know about Tom Girardi’s lawsuit before divorce?

In the first three episodes of Season 11 of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills Erika Jayne only has good things to say about her husband Tom Girardi, who she had to spend a lot more time with because of the pandemic. However, these episodes were filmed in the months and weeks leading up to her bombshell divorce announcement and the subsequent lawsuits against Tom alleging that he embezzled money from victims of an airline tragedy. She’s been very guarded so far during filming, but she’s definitely left some cryptic clues about what her life was really like in 2020.

In the first episode of the season, Dressed to the 90210s, the group gathers for a party for the first time since the pandemic lockdowns. Lisa Rinna gives the women a conversation starter: what’s the best and worst things about the pandemic. Most of the women chat about anxiety but are also grateful that they got to spend more time with their kids than usual. This is a source of hurt for Garcelle, because her kids spent a lot of time away during this time.

Erika Jayne’s answer goes a lot darker, without revealing much about what may really have been giving her a sense of doom. She had to leave her Broadway show Cabaret a few weeks earlier than expected because of COVID-19, and found herself spending a lot of time in the sprawling $15 million L.A. mansion she shared with husband Tom Girardi. However, the insomnia and anxiety symptoms she describes might be triggered by a lot more than the pandemic.

“Mine was like, you know, very dark,” Erika says. “Like all of us, I’m busy all the time. And when I came home from New York, it was really silent. And then, when I didn’t have anything to do I was walking down halls in the house, and I couldn’t sleep. And I couldn’t shake it and I couldn’t shake it.”

“And I was feeling, like, this incredible dread,” she goes on. “Who am I if I’m not working? Every day I woke up and I dreaded waking up.”

Erika then sought help from a psychiatrist and got on the medication Lexapro, which she says helped her. “My problems are still there, but my attitude toward them is different,” she says.

With the second episode “Two Truths and a Lie,” Erika drops another cryptic nugget during an icebreaking activity that has opened up the speculation. The group was playing the game Two Truths and a Lie, and Erika’s contribution got everyone thinking.

Her thre statements were:

“I wore a wire and was a witness in a government case.”

“I am adopted.”

I used to work for the mafia.”

Dorit assumed that the lie was that Erika was adopted, but that’s not the case. Technically Erika was legally adopted by her stepfather. Dumbfounded, the girls couldn’t figure out which of the other statements was a lie, and Erika refused to help them. In light of what’s come out since then, it’s easy to speculate that the lie was probably working for the mafia, and that the wire she wore for a government case might have been a very recent event.

A preview for next week’s episode reveals that Erika announcing her divorce to the RHOBH cast via group text. In further news, the story of Erika and Tom’s marriage will the be subject of an upcoming HULU documentary called The Housewife and the Hustler.

UPDATE: The Housewife and the Hustler revealed that Erika did know about her husband’s legal troubles months prior to filing for divorce in November 2020, as she was subpoenaed twice that year: once in May, 2020, and another time in September 2020. Both were postponed, and all of these leads to speculation about whether or not the wire she refers to wearing above was in relation to a possible federal case against her husband that may be separate from all these mounting civil cases being filed against him.




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