Downtown Lawyer

In 2000, Vergestine Cooper discovered that Bernard, her husband of twenty-eight years, was having an affair.  In order to save their marriage, Bernard signed a contract to pay Vergestine $2,600 if his indiscretions led to a permanent breakdown of the marriage.  In 2005, Bernard disappeared, and Vergestine learned that he had continued the affair.  During the couple’s divorce proceedings, the trial court upheld the terms of contract, but the court of appeals overturned it.  In upholding that decision, the state Iowa Supreme Court cited a 1887 precedent, in which the court rejected a couple’s post-nuptial agreement because it dealt with matters “pertaining so directly and exclusively to matters of the home.”  The current court also rejected “injecting the courts into the complex web of interpersonal relationships and the inevitable he-said-she-said battles that would arise in contracts that can be enforced only through the probing of the marital relationship.”  Accordingly, the court remanded the case for reconsideration without regard to the unenforceable contract.  For the full story, click  here.