British court ruling boosts validity of pre-nuptial deals
The ruling marks a potential turning point in the legal battle over pre-nuptial agreements in England, where courts have generally refused to recognise them as valid, binding agreements.
Nicholas Phillips, president of the Supreme Court, said the judges decided by an 8-1 margin to let stand an earlier Appeals Court ruling that the pre-nuptial agreement in this case was fair and should be applied.
It is a victory for Katrin Radmacher, 40, a paper industry heiress with a fortune of at least £55 million (€39m), and a defeat for her ex-husband, Nicolas Granatino, 39, a former investment banker who had been seeking a greater share of her wealth than had been spelled out in their pre-nup.
The case was complex: Radmacher is German, her ex-husband is French, but they married, lived and divorced in England. The pre-nuptial agreement was signed at Radmacher’s father’s insistence in Germany, and would have been recognised in both France and Germany, where pre-nups are commonly upheld.
“For Nicolas and I, in our homelands – France and Germany – these agreements are entirely normal and routine,” Radmacher said in a statement.
“We made a promise to each other that if anything went wrong between us, both of us would walk away without making financial claims on each other. The promise made to me was broken.”
The heiress appeared nervous before the ruling. She sat only a few feet from Granatino – unkempt in jeans and a sweater – but the two did not even glance at each other.
The couple married in 1998, had two daughters and separated eight years later.
Granatino – sporting both an iPhone and a BlackBerry – declined to comment after the defeat. He paused long enough to embrace his legal team, then hurriedly departed on foot while his former wife made an appearance before the cameras outside the court.
Her lawyer, Simon Bruce, said the decision is a landmark ruling that “means pre-nups are binding as long as they are fair”.
Suzanne Kingston, head of the Family Law Department at Dawsons Solicitors, said the Supreme Court had given the most clear sign to date that pre-nups will now be upheld in England as they are in the rest of Europe and the US.
But others cautioned that the impact may be more limited. Sharon Bennett, a family law expert at a North London firm, said the law is unlikely to change as a result of yesterday’s ruling.
Granatino was awarded almost £6m (€6.8m) in a divorce settlement, but a court last year slashed the payment, citing the pre-nup as justification.
The appeals court said he should receive a lump sum of about £1m plus a £2.5m loan for a house that will be returned when the youngest of the couple’s two daughters reaches the age of 22.
The Supreme Court backed that decision, ruling the couple freely entered into the agreement and that it should be upheld.
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