Diane Plese is a Canadian optometrist who became widely known because of her long marriage to businessman and television investor Robert Herjavec. Many online profiles describe her only as “the ex-wife of a Shark Tank star,” but that label leaves out most of her story. She trained for years as an eye-care professional, ran her own practice, raised three children, and later took part in a major Ontario family-law case that is still discussed by lawyers and legal writers today.
Because Diane Plese has always kept a low public profile, the internet is full of guesses, copied details, and plain mistakes about her. This article separates what is supported by court records and reliable news reports from what is repeated without proof, so you can understand who she really is.
Who Is Diane Plese?
Diane Plese was born and raised in Ontario, Canada. Court records describe her as a trained optometrist, which means she was a licensed professional who examines eyes, tests vision, and prescribes glasses and contact lenses. She is not an actress, a model, or a television personality, even though some low-quality websites claim otherwise. She is also not connected to comedian Drew Carey, a mix-up that appears on a few unreliable pages.
Her exact date of birth has never been confirmed by a trustworthy public source. Some websites say 1959, others say 1970, and news coverage of the 2018 trial described her as being in her mid-fifties, which does not match every claim online. The honest answer is that her birth year is uncertain, and anyone who states it with total confidence is likely repeating another website.
Education and Career in Optometry
According to the Ontario court record, Diane Plese attended the University of Western Ontario after high school and completed a six-year degree in optometry. After graduating she worked in several optometry offices and eventually opened a practice of her own. Running an independent office takes both medical skill and business sense, so this was a real professional achievement before her husband became famous.
Her work pattern changed as her family grew. After the birth of her first child in 1993, she moved from full-time to part-time hours and continued that way between maternity leaves. Around 2003, the Court of Appeal later noted, she stopped working outside the home completely so she could manage the household and the children while her husband focused on expanding his companies. This detail matters because it explains why the court later treated her years at home as a real contribution to the marriage rather than a break from work.
How Diane Plese Met Robert Herjavec
Their love story began in a very ordinary place: an eye appointment. Robert Herjavec first came to Diane Plese as a patient in the late 1980s, when both were in their late twenties. Their relationship developed from there, and they married in June 1990, at a time when Herjavec was far from wealthy.
In fact, shortly after the couple returned from their honeymoon, Herjavec lost his job. He then started his own business, Brak Enterprises, which resold computer security software. The name is a Croatian word meaning marriage, which is a charming reminder of how closely the company’s beginning was tied to the couple’s new life together. Diane Plese was there during these uncertain early years, long before the television fame and the large fortune.
Wealth, Family Trust and Lifestyle
The family’s situation changed dramatically when Brak was sold to AT&T in 2000 for a reported 31 million dollars. The trial judge described the result as a windfall that gave the couple wealth they had never imagined and changed the way the family lived. Herjavec later built a second company, The Herjavec Group, and his career expanded into television on shows such as Dragons’ Den, Shark Tank and Dancing with the Stars.
During the marriage the family also set up a trust in the 1990s, with Herjavec as the only trustee, and moved a large share of his company shares into it. Their lifestyle at the time of separation was described by the courts as exceptionally comfortable. It included a large home in the Bridle Path area of Toronto, a Muskoka cottage, a ski property in Caledon, a home in Florida, private schooling for the children, and access to a company jet. The Toronto house had been bought for 7 million dollars and was sold in 2018 for about 17.4 million dollars.
Children of Diane Plese and Robert Herjavec
The couple has three children. According to the court judgment, a son was born in 1993 and daughters followed in 1996 and 1998. Public accounts name them Brendan, Skye and Caprice. All three were adults by the time of the trial, though two were still considered dependent for support purposes. Their mother has not shared much about their private lives, and that restraint is worth respecting.
Separation and the Court Case
Diane Plese and Robert Herjavec separated on July 24, 2014, after 24 years of marriage. She started the legal process in March 2015, and the case that followed was far more complicated than a simple divorce. It dealt with how to value a privately owned technology company, how to divide homes and other property, how much support should be paid, and how the family trust had been managed.
The case was heard in 2018 by Justice Ruth Mesbur of the Ontario Superior Court and is formally known as Plese v. Herjavec. The trial ran for about four weeks, with many days of evidence from valuation experts, a forensic accountant, and family members. Experts for each side disagreed sharply, and at one point their valuations of the Herjavec Group were reportedly around 30 million dollars apart.
Herjavec remarried in 2016, the same year the divorce became official, when he wed dance professional Kym Johnson, whom he met on Dancing with the Stars. The court proceedings about money, however, continued for several more years.
What the Court Decided
Several different financial decisions came out of the case, and they should not be mixed together. First, the judge ordered an equalization payment of roughly 2.69 million dollars from Herjavec to Plese, which is a calculation that evens out the difference in the net property each spouse built during the marriage. News coverage noted that Plese already held about 20 million dollars in assets from the marriage at that point.
Second, the court ordered Herjavec to pay Plese 125,000 dollars each month in spousal support with no end date. Guideline calculations had suggested an even higher range, but the judge chose a lower amount after weighing the circumstances. The reasoning focused on the fact that Plese had left a professional career to support the family while her husband’s business grew, which legal writers call compensatory support.
Third, Herjavec appealed the support order. In December 2020 the Court of Appeal for Ontario dismissed his appeal in a decision known as 2020 ONCA 810, so the original order stood. The trust issue was handled separately, and the judge found that Herjavec had failed in some record-keeping duties as trustee but described the breach as innocent and found that the beneficiaries had not suffered the loss that was claimed.
Diane Plese Net Worth
Searches for her net worth return numbers ranging from 10 million to over 100 million dollars, and most of them are unsupported guesses. The figure of 25 million dollars appears often because news outlets reported that total after the ruling, combining her existing assets with the equalization payment. It describes her position at the time of the judgment, not a verified balance sheet today.
A real net worth would need information about her investments, property, taxes, spending and debts, and none of that is public. The most responsible way to read the numbers is as historical court figures rather than a current estimate of her wealth.
Common Myths About Diane Plese
Because so many websites copy each other, several false claims have spread widely. Some say the couple divorced in 2004, but the separation happened in 2014 and the divorce was finalized in 2016. Others claim she was a model or actress, which has no support in any court record or credible report. A few pages say the divorce was friendly and effortless, which does not match a multi-year legal dispute with a four-week trial and an appeal.
The safest rule is simple: if a detail about her private life, current home or relationships cannot be traced to a court document or a respected news outlet, treat it as unconfirmed.
Where Is Diane Plese Now?
Diane Plese has stayed out of the spotlight and does not appear to maintain a public social media presence. Reports generally place her in the Toronto area, but there is no reliable confirmation of her current activities, business interests or relationships. Unlike her former husband, she has not built a career in the media, so there are no regular interviews or public updates to draw from.
Why Her Story Still Matters
People keep searching for Diane Plese for a reason beyond celebrity curiosity. Her case became a frequently cited example of how Canadian courts view long marriages in which one partner steps back from a career so the other can build a business. It shows that unpaid work at home, such as raising children and managing a household, can carry real financial weight when a marriage ends.
Understanding her story means looking past the headlines about large dollar amounts and seeing a professional woman who built her own career, supported a husband through his early struggles, and then protected her financial position through a long and detailed legal process.
Disclaimer
This article is written for general information and educational purposes only. It is based on publicly available court records and news reporting, and details may change or be updated over time. It does not offer legal or financial advice, and it makes no claims about the private life of any individual beyond what is publicly documented. Figures such as net worth are estimates reported at the time of the court decision and are not confirmed current values. If you notice an error or want a correction, please contact the publisher.
EXPLORE MORE: Lupe Gidley: Who She Is, Her Acting Credits, and Her Life with Christopher McDonald
Written by Hassan, founder and editor of NTX Magazine — an independent news and biography publication. Every article is researched and cross-checked against multiple public sources before publishing; see our Sourcing Standards page for details.
