Matthew Mellon, billionaire banking heir, dead at 54

NEW YORK -- Billionaire banking heir Matthew Mellon has died. He was 54. His cousin Peter Stephaich confirmed Mellon's death but declined Tuesday to provide any details. He had struggled with drug addiction, and reports said he died at a rehabilitation center in Cancun, Mexico.

Mellon comes from the Mellon and Drexel families of Bank of New York Mellon and Drexel Burnham Lambert.

According to Mellon's Linked In account and documents of the Securities and Exchange Commission, he attended the Wharton School and later worked in fashion, telecommunications and finance, most recently as an adviser for the digital currency company Ripple Labs.

Mellon also served for a time as the chairman of the finance committee of the Republican Party in New York.

Mellon is survived by his first wife, fashion designer Tamara, his second wife, fashion designer Nicole Hanley, and three children.

Testifying at a trial where Mellon was acquitted of hiring a private detective to snoop into Tamara Mellon's finances, the co-founder of Jimmy Choo shoes said she and her husband had met at a meeting of Narcotics Anonymous when both were recovering from addiction.

The two married in 1999 at Blenheim Palace, one of England's grandest homes, with friends Elizabeth Hurley and actor Hugh Grant among the guests. They divorced several years later.