A husband’s entitlement under a pre-nuptial agreement has been reduced after the High Court found that he had doctored emails during a high-value divorce dispute.

The case concerned financial remedy proceedings between a husband and wife who married in 2019 and separated in 2023. Under their pre-nuptial agreement, the husband’s headline entitlement was accepted to be £6,449,802.

However, the court had to decide whether substantial sums already received by him should be treated as part of that entitlement, rather than as separate property belonging to him.

Mr Justice Cusworth considered several disputed payments, including £1.405m taken from joint accounts, £2.05m transferred from a mortgage account using a power of attorney, and £1m moved from the wife’s sole account into a joint account before being transferred to the husband.

A central issue was the authenticity of three emails relied on by the husband. He said they showed that his wife knew about, and agreed to, the transfer of £2.05m. The wife argued that the emails were not genuine.

The judge found that the husband had “the means, the opportunity and the motive” to create and doctor the emails. He said he had “no hesitation” in finding, on the balance of probabilities, that he had done so.

The court also criticised other conduct by the husband during the proceedings, including setting up a private Instagram account containing personal photographs of the wife and instructing a private investigator to attend outside her home. The judge found that these actions were intended to upset, intimidate or destabilise her.

The court concluded that the £1m and £2.05m payments, together with £655,000 taken from the joint account, should be treated as sums already received by the husband under the pre-nuptial agreement. A further £375,000 was deducted to reflect half of the running costs of his investment business.

This reduced his net award to £2,369,385, before costs.

The judge rejected the argument that the husband should lose his entire entitlement under the pre-nuptial agreement, but found that his behaviour was serious enough to affect the final award. He said the husband’s conduct had crossed the threshold where it would be unfair to disregard it.

The case shows that while courts may give significant weight to properly entered pre-nuptial agreements, serious litigation misconduct and unauthorised financial dealings can still affect the outcome.

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Case details

Case: Loh v Loh-Gronager
Court: High Court
Judge: Mr Justice Cusworth
Date: 20 October 2025