Sometimes I Run, Sometimes I Hide, Sometimes I Blog About Britney and K-Fed
Against my better judgment, I'm hitting you (baby!) one more time with information about the Britney Spears - Kevin Federline premarital agreement.
The Smoking Gun has this re-post of the couple's agreement re. their September 18, 2004 "faux" wedding ceremony. What in the world is that? Some details:
At the time, Spears and Federline apparently were itching to get hitched, though negotiations over their pre-nuptial agreement had yet to be finalized. So the couple brought in the lawyers to draft a separate document regarding their planned "faux" marriage and "alleged" wedding ceremony. With no prenup in place, the couple signed the agreement--which was first obtained by Us Weekly--in advance of their purported September 18, 2004 "wedding." They agreed that their blessed union would not be legally valid until the pair later finalized details of Federline's dowry. In her divorce petition, Spears lists October 6, 2004 as the date of her marriage to Federline.
So the timeframe looks like this:
September 14, 2004: "Faux " wedding agreement is signed.
September 18, 2004: "Faux" wedding takes place.
October 6, 2004: Actual wedding takes place.
We still don't know when the prenup was signed, although I've heard it was the day of the wedding (which one?).
There has been speculation that the faux wedding/real wedding stuff was necessary to avoid problems with prenup validity under California law. The section of the California Family Law code governing premarital agreements can be found here. Note the language of ยง1615(c)(2), which requires that:
The party against whom enforcement is sought had not less than seven calendar days between the time that party was first presented with the agreement and advised to seek independent legal counsel and the time the agreement was signed. (Emphasis added)
So, it may have been that the couple intended to marry for real on September 18, 2004, but Mr. Federline wasn't given a draft of the premarital agreement and advised to hire an attorney until September 12th or even later.
A couple of other points:
1. The Smoking Gun's statement that the couple "agreed that their blessed union would not be legally valid until the pair later finalized details of Federline's dowry" may be funny (K-Fed has a hope chest?), but it really isn't accurate. The September 18 agreement says that the parties intend to sign a prenup, but it doesn't make the wedding conditional upon a prenup.
2. Courts have traditionally hated to enforce premarital agreements in cases where there is unequal bargaining power between the spouses. This reluctance stems from the fear that the "poor" spouse is under duress to sign the agreement. I think this provision from the September 18 agreement may be an attempt to solve this problem while actually making things worse:
KEVIN waives the right to allege at a later date that he was under duress in entering into a Cohabitation/Prenuptial Agreement in the future before a valid wedding between the parties as a result of their "faux" wedding ceremony on September 18, 2004.
Would you as a judge give any weight to a statement by Mr. Federline that he wasn't under duress when he signed an agreement he hasn't yet signed, but plans to sign in the future? I certainly wouldn't.
