Grimes Claims Elon Musk Evaded Being Served Custody Papers & It Sparked an All-Out Manhunt

Grimes made headlines late in September when she filed for parental rights of the three children she shares with Elon Musk. But the process was stunted because the tech mogul reportedly evaded being served child custody papers more than a dozen times.

Proof-of-service papers show that Grimes hired four people who tried to serve Musk between Oct. 13 and Oct. 20 at the X headquarters in San Francisco, the SpaceX launch site in Boca Chica, Texas, and his Tesla gigafactory in Austin.

But the search didn’t stop at his places of work. They also searched a horse farm that is tied to him, his private jets, and went to the home of Shivon Zillis, mom of two of Musk’s kids.

It all sounds like a movie, right?! With an ultimately anticlimactic end. Grimes and her lawyers argued that Musk was served via his employees when her complaint was left with security guards at the Tesla factory and X offices.

The petition filed by Grimes (née Claire Boucher) asks the court system to “establish a parental relationship” between herself and the kids she shares with Musk: X Æ A-Xii, 3, Exa Dark Sideræl, 1, and Techno Mechanicus, age unknown. This process is often needed when parents are unmarried. The lawsuit does not mention child custody or child support.

The controversial billionaire is known to have a messy personal life. He has 11 children, has been divorced three times, and was disowned by his trans daughter Vivian for being transphobic.

See if you can follow this part of the timeline (we certainly struggle to!): Grimes and Musk had an on-and-off relationship from 2018-Sept. 2021. Their daughter Exa was born via surrogate at the end of the year. A month before her arrival, Musk welcomed twins with Zillis. News of their arrival didn’t break until July 2022. In Sept. 2023, Musk confirmed he and Grimes had welcomed Techno.

With such a convoluted situation, we’re not surprised this process has been far from straightforward for Grimes. We hope that from here on out things, can go as smoothly as possible — sans horse farm visits.