Court to decide if woman can keep $70,000 engagement ring after man calls off wedding

The latest headlines from our reporters across the US sent straight to your inbox each weekday Your briefing on the latest headlines from across the US Your briefing on the latest headlines from across the US SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court will decide not just whether to side with Bruce Johnson or Caroline Settino but whether to modernize the New England state’s law on engagement rings and maybe even break with other states by no longer bestowing special legal treatment on such rings – a system critics say often unfairly benefits would-be grooms. open image in gallery A $70,000-plus Tiffany engagement ring at the center of a court battle before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in Boston, Massachusetts Lawsuits seeking the return of rings are essentially the last remaining type of litigation over broken engagements recognized by U.S. courts, after states in the 1930s started to abolish “heart balm” claims women previously had been able to pursue when a marriage promise was called off. Initially, many states handled cases over rings the way Massachusetts’ top court decided to in 1959, when it said the giver of an engagement ring is entitled to its return so long as that person was not “at fault” for breaking the engagement. “That’s what I find archaic about the law.” She said courts should get out of the business of regulating engagement rings, which is what the Montana Supreme Court did in 2002 when it charted a new path with a no-take-backs policy that treated the ring as no different than any other gift.