After we began publishing this website, we started receiving tip-offs in our Twitter DMs and via our contact form from the many people Christen Ager-Hanssen had wronged over the years. Several of these pointed to an avenue of work we had no idea he engaged in—’helping’ with divorce cases.
We can exclusively reveal that Christen Ager-Hanssen moonlights as a low-level advisor to divorcing couples. Ager-Hanssen stalks his prey by loitering in various private members clubs in London’s glitzy West End, pretending to be one of Norway’s richest citizens disguised with knock-off clothes and fake designer watches.
Following his sacking from Crypto company nChain, Ager-Hanssen had a soft-ball interview with Norwegian media, in which he claims “I do private investigations. People with a lot of money are interested in my services. My job is to strategize to resolve conflicts. I am a one-man army.” He described his ideal client as an “eccentric billionaire.”
What Ager-Hanssen doesn’t tell his clients is that he is a self-serving cockroach, who will flip sides to wherever the money is. His MO is as follows:
He finds a divorcee at one of the usual haunts in the Mayfair private members clubs. He convinces them he can help them with their problems, pitching himself as wanting to help David fight Goliath.
He then convinces the hapless ‘David’ to fire his legal team and instead pay him to arrange everything. From what we are able to piece together, he uses Zafar Ali for this, the Custos KC behind Craig Wright’s illegal mock trial.
One example we’re able to find is Ager-Hanssen client Martin Wennberg, the estranged husband of Swedish heiress Louise Backstrom, who had representations to the court made on his behalf by Zafar Ali KC:
Think about it, why else would Zafar Ali, a criminal barrister, be so interested in divorce cases?
What a VERY well-placed source tells us is that Ager-Hanssen uses this time to make an approach to the other side in the case, ‘Goliath’, and offers to make their ‘David’ problem go away, which is where the real money is to be made.
If ‘Goliath’ agrees, Ager-Hanssen goes back to ‘David’ and tells him to represent himself in court, plead poverty and pretend not to understand the judges instructions (as Ager-Hanssen tried and failed to in his own legal dispute with NChain ). Let’s not forget, Ager-Hanssen claims to be one of Norway’s richest citizens, yet wants a judge to believe he can’t afford legal representation?
Obviously, the judges are much smarter than Ager-Hanssen, and see through such tactics, as Mr Justice Peel did when he jailed Wennberg for failing to comply with court orders.
Wennberg told the judge [straight out of the Ager-Hanssen playbook]: “I am very stressed…I am very nervous…I have not slept for the last three nights trying to do my best to make sure I comply with everything.”
Justice Peel jailed Wennberg for four weeks for failing to comply with orders. He claimed he had seen evidence that Wennberg had assets of £1.8 million and had no excuse for not being able to find suitable representation.
We understand Ager-Hanssen receives a decent bonus from ‘Goliath’ if they make their ‘David’ problem go away, which makes this recent court filing particularly interesting…
Zhanna Shamalova was married to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s former son-in-law, Kirill Shamalov, and has been locked in a bitter legal dispute with him for years. (Kirill Shamalov was previously married to Putin’s daughter). She subsequently claimed Shamalov had stolen their daughter and was hiding her in Moscow.
In 2021, Kirill Shamalov filed for divorce. and Zhanna Shamalova engaged Ager-Hanssen for help. It’s unclear what exactly the dispute is over, given Ager-Hanssen’s penchant for flip-flopping, covert recording and extortion, it could be anything!
Let’s hope Ager-Hanssen hasn’t done his typical turncoat tactics with Shamalova’s ex-husband, as he has been a sanctioned individual since 2021 and by the UK’s Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation (OFSI) since 2022, which would be a criminal offence if permission was not sought from OFSI…
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