News broke late last week that MacKenzie Scott, one of the richest and most philanthropic women in the world (no shade, I mean it) was divorcing her second husband, a science teacher named Dan Jewett who worked at her sons’ school. MacKenzie married Dan in March, 2021, and they made their announcement along with a statement that they were intending to give away their fortune. As is typical for news about MacKenzie, Amazon founder Jeff Bezo’s ex wife, we only have a small fraction of the story and are likely not to hear much more. She even keeps her donations private now until and unless the organizations choose to make them public. We have just one photo of MacKenzie and Dan together, the one that was used with their wedding announcement, and now they’re over. They both agreed on the separation so it looks somewhat amicable, according to People’s analysis. They have no prenup according to their filing.
Despite her wealth, their divorce will likely be “pretty standard and vanilla,” according to a family law attorney David Glass, who viewed the filing, which was submitted to Washington State’s King County Superior Court on Monday.
Court documents did not confirm the presence of a prenuptial agreement between Scott — who was previously married to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos — and Jewett, who did not contest the divorce, The New York Times noted in its report.
However, the former couple agreed on the terms of the separation, including what becomes of the marital property, in a separation contract.
“A separation contract under Washington law is when you say to your spouse, ‘We’re going to get divorced and we can work out all the details ourselves. Let’s write it up in an agreement and we’ll just notify the court that we’ve figured everything out,’ ” says Glass, who does not represent either party. “And so that’s what they did here.”
Washington State law allows divorcing couples to keep a separation agreement “completely private,” Glass adds, noting that in this case, Scott and Jewett appear to already have the terms of their divorce entirely settled.
“They each had their lawyers, they figured out who’s keeping what real estate, who’s keeping what assets. They decided that there wouldn’t be any sort of spousal support, and because they don’t have any children [together], they didn’t have to get into the issue of custody,” he adds. “And so you basically inform the court in Washington State, ‘We have a separation agreement, we don’t need you for anything other than to issue the divorce decree.’ ”
Because the state’s laws allow for separation agreements to be kept private, Glass says that “no one will ever know” how exactly Scott and Jewett are separating their assets beyond the couple themselves and their attorneys, unless they choose to disclose that information.
People’s legal expert, David Glass, went on to say that this is likely the last filing with the court before it issues a ruling, and that there probably won’t be a court appearance or further details. It’s sad that they didn’t work out, but this is exactly the kind of divorce I would expect from MacKenzie. She just seems so smart, thoughtful and low key. She is working on giving away her fortune and has made it her life’s work. The gossip in me (well me) wants to know what happened to split them up. I would assume it was a lifestyle disagreement, where Dan wanted to live larger and MacKenzie disagreed, but given what little we know about her it’s likely we’ll never learn. If Dan and the people around him are messy though, someone might spill some details. He still has a Facebook page which makes me wonder.
No prenup??? 😲
Every state should allow people to get divorced like this if they want to. My goodness, it probably saves so much time and money. Not to mention it’s way more private and doesn’t leave you exposes to a judge deciding that they can change thy e settlement even if the parties agree, which for some reason the judges can in some states.
Wow, she married with no prenup?!?!
Aww. I really liked them.
Probably just realized that deep down, they are very incompatible. This second marriage seemed to come very quickly on the heels of the first marriage ending.
My guess as well. A second marriage right after your first marriage when that relationship ended in a public and painful way is a lot.
Good luck to them both.
Same. I was saddened when I heard about it but rebound relationships serve a purpose and sometimes it’s just transitional. It didn’t work out for them long term and that’s okay. Especially happy for her it isn’t messy so far. 🤞
I wonder what went down too but I’m still on the no prenuptial agreement. Yikes.
I was going to say that even if he is entitled to only half of wht she made during the marriage that might still be a chunk right?
Kinda hard to believe she had no prenup. Or if they married quickly no post nup. I mean everyone, including peasants like us, should have a prenup if they have any children from a first marriage and any kind of property and other assets. I mean she has four children and what if God forbid she had died while still married to the science teacher? I like McKenzie (for the little I’ve heard about her) but she seems to have a singular attitude toward her wealth. Maybe that it’s the root of all evil and blames what happened to her first marriage on it?
Perhaps, he seemed like a breath of fresh air in the beginning. I’m sure after being married to Bezos, it was comforting to be with a “normal” guy, who works as a teacher. In the end, she probably just realized that their lives were too different.
Re the prenup: it states that they didn’t disclose a prenup in their divorce documents, not necessarily that they didn’t have one. If the divorce is amicable, they can settle it on their own, and don’t need a judge to enforce the prenup.
She got divorced before I knew she’d gotten married.
Lol, I had the same reaction. First, it was “Who? Oh yeah, that’s who,” and then “huh, she got married?” The very definition of low-key.
No way there wasn’t some sort of pre-nup agreement. Maybe not a typical one that the court gets alerted to, but there HAD to be something spelling out what would happen if they split. She’s a smart woman with billions and billions, and a clear idea what she wants to do with them. No way she didn’t plan ahead.
Ouch, no prenup. Hope all ends well for her.
I think the rule is that what you came to the marriage with is not marital property–it’s what you accrued during the marriage. So he’s entitled to a piece of whatever interest or capital gains she acquired in the last 18 months or so. Also, I have to assume that she has her fortune is held in accounts controlled by the foundation and is not marital property. Very rich people use holding companies owned by other companies for high-value assets, and saddle them with debt so they’re not technically worth anything, despite holding major assets. She’s not taking a bath on this divorce.
Exactly. This People article doesn’t seem too fired up about the lack of a prenup, and I have zero doubt the press would be flipping out if it was anything significant.
Married less than two years to a woman with a TEAM of lawyers in Washington state? Meh, she’s fine.
(I too, however, am nosey/sad that this didn’t work out. I really wanted a nice, normal marriage for Mackenzie.)
Marry in haste, repent at leisure.
I thought she had gotten married this year for some reason but it’s still a pretty quickie divorce (though not as quickie as my friend whose sister in law filed for divorce after 5 days which I found out over the weekend). I hope she’s okay emotionally, that’s a lot to go through in just a few years. I also wonder what happened but she is the most discreet person ever (most super rich people are) and we will likely never know.
Mo money mo problems.
It was a short marriage and she has plenty of money.
He’ll get a few mill to maintain his lifestyle and hopefully they’ll stay friends.
I was surprised that she remarried so quickly, especially with many children still living at home.
Covid.
They said there is no evidence of a prenup, not that there isn’t one. Read what the local divorce attorney said. Specifically noted that it’s unlikely that there is not a prenup, but the separation agreement makes that all private.
Also, please stop assuming you know Mackenzie Scott. She married a teacher from her kid’s school soon after her 1st divorce. If anything, that raised eyebrows about an ‘overlap’ (who at that age gets married so quickly?), not the divorce from Jeff Bezos. There really haven’t been any rumors about Bezos’ bad behavior in Seattle (look to Gates for those). For all we know – and we never will – Scott could have been the one done with the marriage long before Bezos was.
MacKenzie was the one who filed for divorce once reports of Jeff’s affair with Lauren Sanchez became public. The only *overlap* was on his side.
Things happen—he or she could have wanted kids or more kids and the other didn’t.