Source: David Crotty / Getty
A judge declared Kim Kardashian legally single over a year after the high-profile celebrity filed for divorce from her estranged husband, Kanye West.
Kim’s request was granted during a bifurcation hearing via a video conference on Tuesday that Kanye didn’t attend.
Moving forward, the socialite turned billionaire will return to being formally referred to as Kim Kardashian, and not Kim Kardashian-West, according to TMZ.
By default, the judge’s ruling makes Kanye legally single as well.
Kim filed for divorce from Kanye in Feb. 2021. Amid the tumultuous and lengthy ongoing proceedings, she requested to be declared legally single last December.
Kanye challenged Kim’s independence request last month. He claimed her being legally single without their camps coming to agreements on the custody of their children, plans for divvying up their assets and so on was “a risk of adverse consequence,” PEOPLE reported.
“An early termination of status also creates barriers to obtaining evidence” if either of them “remarries before the case is concluded,” Kanye’s challenge added.
The Donda rapper and his legal team highlighted their feeling that “Kim’s motion should be denied without prejudice so that Kim can refile it with the mandatory corrections and requested conditions.”
The judge ruled on the protective specifications Kanye’s camp requested during the video conference hearing that went down on March 1, as well.
The presiding official granted the rapper’s request that “any right to get reimbursement of money that’s supposed to be divided up will be preserved in case either of them dies.”
The rapper other two conditions were denied. In them, Kanye asked Kim not be allowed to “transfer any assets she had in trust” and that the reality TV star waives her “marital privilege” so their conversations as husband and wife are protected from being testified about in court by a new spouse.
Kanye popped the question to Kim in 2013, and the two were wed the following year.
They share four children: daughters North, 8, and Chicago, 4, and sons Saint, 6, and Psalm, 2.
In court documents Kim filed on Feb. 23, the star penned in part:
“I very much desire to be divorced. I have asked Kanye to keep our divorce private, but he has not done so. Kanye has been putting a lot of misinformation regarding our private family matters and co-parenting on social media which has created emotional distress. I believe that the court terminating our marital status will help Kanye to accept that our marital relationship is over and to move forward on a better path which will assist us in peacefully co-parenting our children.”
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