Rineharts’ laundry laid out in court

THE son of Gina Rinehart, Australia’s richest person, called his youngest sister ‘‘an oxygen thief’’, it was alleged as a long-running feud over the family’s fortunes reached court three years after the case was lodged.

The embarrassing legal fight over control of a multibillion-dollar trust fund has led to the damaging release of private, frequently vitriolic emails and correspondence between Rinehart and her four children.

Bianca Rinehart, 37, the oldest daughter, told the Supreme Court of New South Wales in Sydney that she had been threatened by her mother, but was determined to try to gain control of the A$5 billion (NZ$5.4b) family trust.

Bianca was forced to admit she may have referred to her brother, John Hancock, 38 – her effective ally in the case – as an ‘‘idiot’’, and that she may have criticised his ‘‘destructive’’ drinking and gambling problems.

The case centres on a trust set up more than 20 years ago by Gina’s late father, mining magnate Lang Hancock.

The court heard that John emailed his mother to describe his sister Ginia, whom his mother favoured, as a moron and ‘‘intellectually disabled’’ and suggested she ‘‘wear a bag over her head – cover up her genetic deficiencies from prying eyes’’. He also called her an oxygen thief.

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