Lloyd Klein is opening up about his final moments with his fiancée Jocelyn Wildenstein.
Klein, 57, revealed to People that he was with the socialite just before her death at 84 on New Year’s Eve.
Wildenstein, who was dubbed the ‘Catwoman’ due to her appearance-altering cosmetic surgeries over the years, died ‘peacefully’ in her sleep, her longtime partner told the publication.
‘We had a nice happy hour the same night and we were getting ready for the new year, and we took a little nap just to look good before getting dressed,’ Klein recalled.
‘We were having a nap and when I [woke] up, I said, “Jocelyn, we have to wake up, we have to get dressed,” and she was cold and she was dead,’ he added.
‘It’s very sad. It’s extremely sad,’ the French fashion designer continued somberly. ‘It’s extremely sad to lay down with your other half that I know for 21 years and waiting to celebrate New Year’s Eve and to find her cold.’
Lloyd Klein, 57, opened up about his final moments with his fiancée Jocelyn Wildenstein while speaking to People after her death at 84 on New Year’s Eve; seen together in 2015 in NYC
Klein claimed that Wildenstein had been suffering from phlebitis, a condition in which blood vessels become inflamed, according to WebMD.
The condition can sometimes lead to potentially deadly blood clots.
‘Because of her phlebitis, the legs were very, very swollen, and the blood was blocked, and there was no oxygen in the brain,’ Klein claimed.
It was previously reported by AFP that Wildenstein had died of a pulmonary embolism, which is when a blood clot blocks blood flow to the lungs.
The deadly condition is often caused by blood clots in the legs that travel to the lungs, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Klein added that Wildenstein’s grandmother had also suffered from phlebitis, but the condition didn’t negatively affect their holiday celebrations, and he said she was otherwise in ‘impeccable health.’
He recalled that ‘everything was good’ in his final days with his fiancée, and he said that Wildenstein, who had been spending time with him in Paris, had been ‘very happy’ and ‘at the top of her game’ at the time.
Wildenstein was last seen looking healthy on December 18 in Paris with Klein.
Klein said Wildenstein died ‘peacefully’ in her sleep after they took a nap before their New Year’s Eve festivities; pictured in September 2022 in NYC
!['We were having a nap and when I [woke] up, I said, "Jocelyn, we have to wake up, we have to get dressed," and she was cold and she was dead,' he said; pictured in 2019 in Miami, Florida](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/02/15/93674573-14244019-image-a-15_1735831501676.jpg)
‘We were having a nap and when I [woke] up, I said, “Jocelyn, we have to wake up, we have to get dressed,” and she was cold and she was dead,’ he said; pictured in 2019 in Miami, Florida
Klein said Wildenstein had suffered from phlebitis, or inflammation of blood vessels. AFP reported she died of a pulmonary embolism, in which a blood clot blocks circulation to the lungs; pictured together in May 2023 in LA
The star smiled at onlookers while in a fur jacket, leggings and boots as she wore black sunglasses and styled her blonde hair in soft waves over her shoulders.
Following her divorce from Alec N. Wildenstein, Jocelyn began dating Klein in 2003.
The two later got engaged, but they have had a bumpy relationship over the years.
In 2016, Wildenstein was arrested for slashing Klein’s face with scissors during a fight at her Trump Tower apartment.
Klein was subsequently arrested days later for robbery and assault after he allegedly tried to retrieve some of his belongings from Wildenstein’s apartment.
But the couple later reunited.
The Swiss-born socialite, who had over 1 million Instagram followers, described herself as an ‘art dealer.’
She came from humble origins, only to tie the knot in the 1970s with a French-born American billionaire.
He recalled that ‘everything was good’ in his final days with his fiancée, and he said that Wildenstein, who had been spending time with him in Paris, had been ‘very happy’ and ‘at the top of her game’ at the time; seen in May 2023 in LA
Here she is seen at a much younger age as she held onto a child
But the two courted headlines just over two decades later with their messy divorce.
She became one of the wealthiest people on the planet after her divorce settlement, which left her with more than $2 billion, plus millions more annually.
But she somehow managed to lose it all after years of tinkering with her face and spending on countless luxuries.
The high society fixture was married to the late art dealer and billionaire Alec N. Wildenstein, who was the son of the French art dealer and horse breeder Daniel Wildenstein.
Their family presided over Wildenstein & Co., an influential Paris-based art dealership.
While speaking to The Times of London, Jocelyn described how she became fascinated by Africa and its fauna after finding a box of picture books about the continent when she was a child.
Later, she developed an interest in hunting and wildlife, which led her to the Wildenstein family ranch Ol Jogi, located in Kenya.
There, she was introduced on a safari to Alec by Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi arms dealer.
Wildenstein was previously married to Alec N. Wildenstein. They met at his family’s African ranch in 1977 before eloping in Las Vegas in 1978; pictured in 2000 in Paris
Jocelyn lived a life of luxury with Wildenstein, but they divorced in 2000, allegedly after she discovered his infidelities. She won a stunning $2.5B in the divorce, plus $100M to be paid annually for 13 years; pictured in 1997 in Manhattan
But the lion-faced socialite frittered away the fortune through extravagant purchases. She also claims a painting comprising part of her trust turned out to be a forgery, while another was auctioned for tens of millions less than expected; seen in 2017 in NYC
Jocelyn recalled how Alec decided to kill a lion that had been killing nearby antelope, so she accompanied him on a pre-dawn mission.
She recounted how, after her future husband took down the lion with one shot — plus a second for good measure — they ate part of the animal as a kind of trophy and rubbed its blood on their necks.
‘You must eat a part of the heart of your game,’ she said. ‘It’s legend. Maybe to take the power of the lion.’
But by the ’90s, Jocelyn was completely unrecognizable after her face was transformed reportedly from numerous cosmetic surgeries.
They left her with slanted cat eyes, a prominent chin and exaggerated cheek bones, which some have compared to a lion’s face.
Despite the obvious change in her appearance, Wildenstein at one time bizarrely claimed to have never had plastic surgery.
Alec did comment on her face. He told Vanity Fair, ‘She was crazy. I would always find out last. She was thinking that she could fix her face like a piece of furniture. Skin does not work that way. But she wouldn’t listen.’
Wildenstein fired back that he ‘hired a publicist and paid a plastic surgeon to certify that I completely changed my face’ to win the divorce, she stated.
Wildenstein was arrested for assault in 2016 after slashing Klein’s face with scissors, and he was arrested for robbery and assault days later while allegedly trying to take his belongings from her apartment. But the two reunited and are together to this day; seen in 2017 in NYC
More recently she owned up to having some procedures, though she downplayed its impact.
In the wake of years of reported over-the-top spending and seemingly unending cosmetic procedures, Alec filed for divorce in 1999, though Jocelyn has said she was the one to first decide to end the marriage due to her husband’s infidelities.
Although he filed for divorce in Switzerland, where Jocelyn was less likely to get a significant divorce settlement, she ended up receiving what should have been a windfall — a reported $2.5 billion.
On top of that, she was to be paid $100 million per year for 13 years by her ex-husband, and later his estate following his death in 2008 at 67.
However, her ex-husband’s family cut off the payments in 2015.
Despite obtaining more wealth than most people could ever imagine, Wildenstein managed to fritter it away through extravagant purchases on clothing, jewels, art and even tens of thousands of dollars in annual phone bills.
In 2018, she claimed to Page Six that the vast majority of her wealth disappeared because one of the paintings that was part of the trust set up for her in the divorce settlement, attributed to Diego Velázquez, turned out to be a forgery, while a Cézanne that was expected to go for around $35 on auction only sold for $4.7 million
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