A Colorado businesswoman and her fiancé were awarded a total of $21 million after a jury decided her ex-husband lied about his new partner sexually abusing their children.
Cindy Hayek, 54, and her now-fiancé Kenny Hamp were victims of a smear campaign by her former fracking magnate Steven Herron, who lied to gain custody of their daughter, now 17, and their children. twins of 13…
She and Herron divorced in 2016 and were awarded joint custody of their children. But Hamp was arrested and charged with felony child abuse in 2019, just one day after he and Hayek announced their engagement.
Earlier the same year, Hayek, an oil and gas geologist who also owns a clothing store, had won a $10.5 million settlement after suing her ex for fraud, claiming he owed her money. for the $90 million sale of his fracking company.
Hayek, who lives in a stunning $8 million home in Steamboat Springs, ultimately saw her time with her children restricted after she refused to say that Hamp had abused the children.
Cindy Hayek, 54, and her now-fiancé Kenny Hamp (pictured) were victims of a smear campaign by her former fracking magnate Steven Herron.
Herron lied to gain custody of her now 17-year-old daughter and 13-year-old twin sons.
‘They asked me to choose between my children and the truth. And for four years I had to choose the truth,’ said the businesswoman. FOX31.
Herron was then granted full custody of their three children and moved with them to Hawaii in 2021.
“It’s the worst thing you can be accused of,” Hamp told the local media. “It was humiliating, embarrassing and ruined my reputation.”
Herron’s false accusations began with a visit to the doctor where he claimed that one of his sons was complaining about a ‘wettie’.
But when forensic investigators interviewed them, the children admitted that their father had told them that Hamp sexually abused them.
“He said, ‘You’ve been sexually assaulted.’ And then he took me to my room,” one of the sons told detectives about Herron.
Footage of an interview between Herron and Steamboat Springs police shows a detective telling her he would try to have the child abuse charge against Hamp upgraded to sexual assault.
Herron then told the police officer: ‘I would hug you right now…
“You made my fucking day bro, like you’re on my Christmas card list right now.”
Court-appointed parenting supervisor Terry Duffin told FOX31 she did not believe the children had been abused and saw no evidence of trauma. Meanwhile, she said, Herron showed signs of a scorned ex.
“For quite some time he talked angrily about how Mom got money she didn’t deserve,” Duffin said. ‘Steve was very, very angry because Mum was still around her and he was trying to cut her out of the children’s lives. That’s what I felt.”
Footage of an interview between Herron and Steamboat Springs police shows a detective telling her he would try to have the child abuse charge against Hamp upgraded to sexual assault.
‘They asked me to choose between my children and the truth. And for four years I had to choose the truth,’ the businesswoman told FOX31.
Hakek’s home in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, is shown above
The case against Hamp was dismissed in 2020 after prosecutors decided there was not enough evidence to convict him. Then, in 2021, the Colorado Department of Human Services issued a settlement stating that the “findings were overturned” regarding allegations of child sexual abuse.
However, she was still unable to see her children and regain custody.
Hayek then filed a civil lawsuit against her ex, alleging that Herron’s doctor shopped around and lied to police and social workers to spread her child abuse lies against Hamp.
He said Herron used ‘abrasions on the buttocks’ of one of his sons as evidence, but they probably came from long sessions of cycling.
The lawsuit claims Herron repeatedly told the boy, who was eight years old at the time, that he had been abused until the boy believed it.
After a five-week trial that concluded in November, a jury awarded Hayek $7.6 million and Hamp nearly $13.68 million.
Hakey now plans to ask a domestic relations judge to grant him reintegration therapy with his children, whom he has not been able to speak to since a Zoom visit in January 2021.
The jury found Herron guilty of defamation, conspiracy, scandalous conduct, abuse of process and malicious prosecution.
Hakey said, however, that he has spent nearly $8 million of his own money on the custody battle and subsequent trial, meaning he still has money left out of his pocket.
She now plans to ask a domestic relations judge to grant her reintegration therapy with her children, with whom she has not been allowed to speak since a Zoom visit in January 2021.
Herron stated during the trial that the mother and her children are no longer related.