Funniest story of the year: Fuzzy math

This has to be the funniest story of 2009. Lia Lambrino, the wife of Paul Lambrino, is said to be pregnant at age 56 years old.

Hmmm, it seems someone has shaved four years off her age as the former Lia Triff, who was once married to lawyer Melvin Belli, was born February 23, 1949, at Great Lakes, Illinois. She will celebrate her 61st birthday in two months.

Paul Lambrino, who was born in 1948, is the elder son of the late Carol Lambrino, elder half-brother of King Michael of Roumania. Paul pretends to be a Prince of Romania, but he is not entitled to the title of Prince or the style of Royal Highness. In the late 1950s, courts in France and Portugal acknowledged that the late Carol Lambrino was a legitimate son of King Carol and his first wife, Zizi Lambrino.

 This case was settled for purposes of inheritance of King Carol's property in France and Portugal. Carol Lambrino and his half-brother Michael were heirs to property in these two countries. In France, the inheritance was a house that was in desperate need of repair.

The courts of France and Portugal were not in a position to rule on Roumanian titles. The decisions handed down by the courts did not reference titles for Carol Lambrino, although he soon began to use the title HRH Prince Carol of Roumania. His elder son, Paul, has continued this pretense.

When Paul and Lia announced they were expecting a child in the fall of 1997, Lia's age was given as 48. Twelve years, she is described as 56. I call that fuzzy math! She married San Francisco lawyer, Melvin Belli, in 1972, in the same year, she graduated from the University of Maryland. She was 23-years-old at the time of the wedding - and her graduation. In 1984, when the then Lia Belli was running for the California State Senate, she was described as 35 years old.

She blamed "misunderstandings" and "staff errors" for mistakes on her campaign brochures. The campaign material included claims that Lia had received a master's degree in urban science from Occidental College in Los Angeles. School officials stated that she had "completed most of her credits and is certainly close to a degree." Although Lia had claimed that she had mailed her 80-page thesis to the school in 1983, the school's registrar stated that "it didn't get to us."

Lia's response: "I suppose I should have waited until I got the sheepskin or degree in hand before putting it on campaign literature." The campaign literature also included a statement that she had been awarded the Fulbright scholarship in 1971 to go to Romania. In fact, Lia had been selected for a Fulbright, but never picked up the grant. She said she declined the award "on the advice of the State Department, which cautioned that her uncle's defection from that country's soccer team would make her visit 'unwise,' " reported the Associated Press in 1984.

She also had to acknowledge that she did not graduate from the University of Maryland cum laude, which also appeared in her campaign literature.
"I did not put it on there. Someone in my office must have done it without checking ... I was just a graduate."

Melvin Belli was 64 when he married Lia Triff on June 3, 1972.

After 16 years of marriage, the couple was divorced in a very contentious divorce. Belli was ordered to pay Lia $25,000 per month in alimony. The couple did not have a prenuptial agreement. The couple's marital problems made the front pages of San Francisco's newspapers in 1988. Lia claimed that someone broke into the family home and fired two shots at her. She was not hurt. Belli, who was in the Soviet Union at the time, called home and asked about the couple's greyhound, Rumproast, and three other dogs. Lia claimed that Belli never asked about her.
In her statements to the police, Lia claimed that her husband had abused her and their 15-year-old daughter, Melia. After filing official separation papers, Lia "took possession" of the family mansion, and Belli moved to his yacht. He stated that he had "never laid a hand on her."

Shortly after the news of the separation was made public, Viscount Mandeville, 26, was questioned by the police regarding the shooting. He was not detained and stated that he was in Los Angeles at the time of the shooting. But he did admit to being in love with Lia. "I have had a lot of girlfriends, but she is the only one who has really lit my fire," he said.

Lia's only living child, Melia (apparently named for her parents, MElvin and LIA) has forged her own impressive academic career.

http://artsci.wustl.edu/~artarch/sections/faculty/belli.html
http://www.bucharestherald.com/dailyevents/41-dailyevents/4860-prinesa-lia-insarcinata-la-56-de-ani-va-aduce-pe-lume-un-mostenitor-al-familiei-regale-