16 Jan Dec 12 Round Up

There are three cases from the Kentucky Court of Appeals from the week of December 12. Read on to see the ins and outs of them according to us here at the Round Up.

Denetta Kaye Cornett v. Jack Wayne Cornett, 2024-CA-0028

In this case, Judge Acree affirmed the trial court’s finding that a prenuptial agreement was valid. Sometimes the law does exactly what it says it will do — even when the facts tug hard in the other direction. That’s the takeaway from Cornett v. Cornett, an unpublished December 2025 decision from the Kentucky Court of Appeals affirming enforcement of a nearly 30-year-old antenuptial agreement.

Denetta and Jack Cornett married in 1995 after living together for about a year. Jack had been through a prior divorce that nearly dragged his family’s machine shop into the marital estate. Burned once, he made it clear early on: no marriage without a prenup.

Three days before the wedding, Denetta met with the drafting attorney and signed the agreement. The prenup waived claims to separate property, appreciation of that property, and—importantly—any future maintenance, regardless of the length of the marriage.

Fast-forward almost 25 years. Jack files for divorce. Denetta challenges the prenup as unconscionable, arguing (1) she never received full disclosure of Jack’s assets and (2) enforcement would be unjust given a traumatic brain injury she suffered in a serious car accident during the divorce.

The Family Court enforced the agreement. Denetta appealed.

The Court of Appeals affirmed, and it did so in a way that may raise some eyebrows.

“Fully Apprised” Was Enough

Denetta argued the trial court watered down the legal standard by finding she was “fully apprised” of Jack’s assets instead of requiring “full and complete disclosure.”

The Court wasn’t buying it.

In a surprisingly blunt passage, the panel dismissed the argument as semantics, holding that there is no meaningful legal distinction between being “apprised” and being “fully disclosed.” No asset schedules. No formal valuation. No problem.

What mattered instead:

• The parties lived together for a year.
• Denetta knew about the machine shop.
• She admitted no one lied to her or forced her to sign.
• The agreement itself recited full disclosure.
• Jack’s interest had already been adjudicated nonmarital in his first divorce. (The crackerjack writers here at the Round Up believe that this was the key fact in the case.)

Bottom line: Kentucky law does not require a spreadsheet if testimony and context convince the trial court that nothing material was hidden.

A Tragic Injury Didn’t Make the Prenup Unconscionable

This is where the holding feels especially harsh.

Denetta suffered a traumatic brain injury and faced significant medical uncertainty. She argued that no one could have contemplated that outcome in 1995—and that enforcing a lifetime maintenance waiver under those circumstances “worked an injustice.”

The Court disagreed.

Relying on Blue v. Blue, the panel emphasized that unconscionability is judged case-by-case and that the burden rests squarely on the spouse attacking the agreement. The Court noted:

• Denetta stood to receive six figures from the sale of the marital home.
• She had a pending personal injury claim that could offset medical costs.
• The prenup contemplated death and other contingencies.

Accidents, the Court said, are not automatically beyond contemplation — and without concrete proof of injustice, the agreement stands. A win for the enforceability of prenuptial agreements.

Unreported. http://opinions.kycourts.net/COA/2024-CA-000028.PDF

Scott Williams Mitchell v. Cher Beilfuss Mitchell, 2024-CA-0057, and cross-appeal

This case reads like a financial thriller: a marriage on life support, a risky stock bet, a $16 million spike — and then a crash. In Mitchell v. Mitchell, the Kentucky Court of Appeals steps in to fix part of a divorce ruling that relied too heavily on a momentary, paper-only fortune that vanished almost as fast as it appeared.

Billy Mitchell, a commercial airline pilot, and Cher Mitchell married in 2011. They spent much of the marriage living apart while trying—unsuccessfully—to make things work. A divorce decree was entered in late 2020, but the court postponed deciding how to divide their property.

Right after the divorce decree, Billy’s retirement account—invested heavily in a speculative stock—skyrocketed in value. On paper, the account briefly topped $16 million.

Then reality hit. The stock price collapsed. Most of the gains disappeared.

By the time the court finally divided the property years later, the big question wasn’t what the account was worth—it was when.

The trial court picked a date near the peak of the stock’s value and divided the retirement account based on that number. It also ruled that the mortgage payments Billy made on the marital farm after the divorce still counted as marital property. On top of that, Billy was ordered to pay interest and Cher’s expert fees.

Billy appealed. The Court of Appeals agreed that:

• Market-driven growth can still be marital property, even after a divorce decree.
• Interest on a large equalization payment was appropriate.
• Attorney’s fees and expert costs were justified given the discovery problems.

But the appellate court also said that the trial court went too far in two key ways.

Post-divorce mortgage payments weren’t marital. Billy paid more than $90,000 toward the farm mortgage after the divorce while living there alone. There was no solid proof that Cher contributed to those payments. That money, said the Court, should have been treated as Billy’s separate property.

The retirement account valuation was unfair. This is the big one. The trial court used the highest point of the stock’s value — even though the gains were mostly unrealized and quickly erased. By doing so, it effectively gave one spouse the benefit of a windfall that no longer existed. The Court of Appeals called that unreasonable.

If a court chooses a date after the divorce to value property, it has to pick one that reflects economic reality — not a brief spike that disappears weeks later. So, the retirement division was vacated and sent back for a do-over.

All in all, this is one case that both lawyers and judges should know.

Unreported. http://opinions.kycourts.net/COA/2024-CA-000057.PDF

J.R.R. v. K.J., A.E., L.M.J.R., and P.J., 2025-CA-0423

This is a hard case, but not a close one.

In J.R.R. v. K.J., the Kentucky Court of Appeals affirmed an adoption over a biological father’s objection—bringing a decade-long saga to an end and making official what had been true in practice for nearly the child’s entire life.

The child in this case was born in 2014, premature and medically fragile, with drugs in his system. Within weeks, he was living full-time with his maternal grandmother and step-grandfather—the people who would ultimately become his adoptive parents.

They raised him. They took him to doctors and therapists. They enrolled him in school. They were there every day.

The biological father? He was technically granted supervised visitation years ago — but rarely used it.

This also wasn’t the first attempt to adopt the child. The grandparents filed an adoption petition back in 2018. After years of litigation, that first petition was denied—not because adoption wasn’t appropriate, but because the trial court applied the wrong legal framework. Even after a remand, the court still declined to grant adoption.

So the grandparents tried again. They filed a second adoption petition in a new county after moving to give the child a more stable home environment. This time, several important things had changed:

• The child was older and more aware of his circumstances.
• The biological mother consented to the adoption.
• The father continued to miss visits and failed to increase his involvement.
• The mother’s struggle with addiction continued and included repeated overdoses.
  

The Father’s Arguments and Why They Failed

Res Judicata: “You already tried this”

The father argued the case should be dismissed because adoption had already been denied once. The Court of Appeals disagreed.

In child-related cases, prior rulings don’t lock the door forever. When circumstances materially change, courts are allowed — indeed required — to take another look. Here, the changes were significant. The second petition wasn’t just a rerun of the first.

Continuance: “I needed more time”

The father also argued that the trial court should have postponed the final hearing because he had hired new counsel shortly before trial.

The Court was unmoved.

The case had already been continued twice. The hearing date had been known for The case had already been continued twice. The hearing date had been known for months. Waiting until days before trial to change lawyers doesn’t entitle a party to delay a child’s future — especially in an adoption case.

“There wasn’t enough evidence”

This was the heart of the appeal — and the Court rejected it outright.

The evidence showed that the father:

• used only about 30% of his scheduled parenting time;
• sometimes went months without seeing the child;
• missed visits for trivial reasons such as traffic, workouts, cable appointments, etc.;
• never attended medical appointments or surgeries;
• never helped with school, homework, or daily care; and
• never sought to expand visitation or remove supervision.

Meanwhile, the grandparents provided everything — food, shelter, medical care, education, stability, and emotional support.

The Court held that there was clear and convincing evidence that the father:

• failed to provide essential parental care;
• failed to meet the child’s basic needs; and
• had no realistic prospect of improvement.

And most importantly, adoption was plainly in the child’s best interests. This decision reinforces a reality that Family Court judges see every day: biology alone does not make a parent. When a child has spent nearly their entire life with caregivers who show up, provide stability, and meet every need, courts will not allow uncertainty to drag on indefinitely.

Adoption cases are among the most serious decisions courts make. They permanently sever parental rights. That’s why the burden of proof is high. But when the evidence shows years of absence, missed opportunities, and no meaningful effort to change, finality becomes an act of protection, not punishment.

In J.R.R., the Court of Appeals affirmed what the child already knew: these were his parents.

Unreported. http://opinions.kycourts.net/COA/2025-CA-000423.PDF

Thanks for reading. Click here for the previous Round Up.