With This Ring, I… Take Thee to Court

Some say a diamond is forever, but if you and your boo don’t say “I do” at the altar you may have to part ways with the sparkly piece of happiness you’ve been relentlessly flashing on Instagram.

Kim Kardashian made it to the altar, but kept it klassy and returned the 20-carat diamond ring to Kris Humphries after their 72-day marriage went kaput. He gladly auctioned it off for a whopping $749,000 this past Tuesday. Ka-ching!

But Vancouver’s Jessica Bennett is the latest almost-bride who refuses to give back the $16,500 sapphire and diamond ring her beau, Charlie Zampieri, proposed marriage with.

Whenever one of these engagement ring brawls end up in court, many engaged ladies look down at their rock and ponder: is this mine forever? Well, it depends where you live.

The majority of courts like those in New York, look at the engagement ring as a promise for marriage. If the bride never walks down the aisle, she must return the ring because she never delivered her part of the bargain. On the flip side, some states, California included, tend to rule that whoever effed up loses entitlement to the ring. So, gents, if monogamy wasn’t your thing and your cheating ways were the cause of the split, the ring is hers free and clear.

However, there are a handful of places, such as Kansas and Montana, that believe an engagement ring is an absolute gift. This means that if an engagement falls apart and you don’t live happily ever after with your honey, you can still walk off into the sunset with your sparkly ring… or pawn it and go on a shopping spree.

Moral of the story, if you are the traditional sort of damsel that expects your future betrothed to get down on bended knee and propose, your best bet is to click your heels twice and move to Kansas.