NBA free agent Tristan Thompson won a huge victory in family court as a judge slashed his child support to Maralee Nichols from $40,000 a month to just $9,500.
Sources tell TMZ that Tristan, 31, and Maralee, 32, have agreed to terms for Theo, their 1-year-old son. Tristan will pay $9,500 a month in child support and also cover some of Nichols’ attorney fees.
The settlement is a victory for the unemployed NBA star who already pays $80,000 a month in child support for his other two children.
Maralee fell pregnant with Theo after a consensual encounter with Tristan in a Houston hotel in March 2021.
Maralee gave birth to Theo in December 2021 and immediately sued Tristan for child support. She claimed he offered to pay her $75,000 to stay silent about the baby.
After a paternity test confirmed he was the father, Tristan apologized publicly to Khloe Kardashian, saying, “You don’t deserve the heartache and humiliation I have caused you. You don’t deserve the way I have treated you over the years. My actions have certainly not lined up with the way I view you.”
Tristan has earned over $100 million as an NBA player who last played for the Chicago Bulls. He won an NBA championship with the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2016.
But he’s currently a free agent and isn’t bringing in enough money to cover his child support debts. Tristan reportedly told Khloe, mother of his 4-year-old daughter, True, and Jordan Craig, mom to his 6-year-old son, Prince, that his NBA career was coming to an end.
He warned them that his child support payments may be far and few in between if his NBA salary ended.
Tristan’s loss of income was a determining factor in the judge’s decision to cut his child support payments to just $9,500 a month. Which means Maralee wasted her time moving from Houston to California.
Sources tell TMZ, Maralee will have sole custody of Theo, and while visitation isn’t official yet, those talks will come in the near future.
Tristan will be listed as the biological father on Theo’s birth certificate.
Khloe and Tristan welcomed a son via a surrogate in July. They are not together, because he allegedly has an eye for strippers and escorts.
