## Facts

- Matthew Bisque (husband) and Cheryl Bisque (wife) were married for seven years and had no children; both worked, and wife earned more.
- Seeking a quick divorce, the parties used a mail-order Mexican divorce kit.
- Without lawyers, they signed a written, notarized agreement that awarded wife the bulk of the marital estate, including the marital home and an adjacent lot.
- The next day, they mailed the Mexican divorce paperwork, including special powers of attorney that referenced the agreement.
- They also executed deeds transferring their real property interests to wife.
- A Mexican divorce decree issued shortly thereafter and referenced the parties’ agreement.
- About two months later, husband filed a Colorado dissolution action.
- Wife responded by seeking a declaratory judgment that the Mexican decree had already dissolved the marriage.
- The Colorado trial court ruled the Mexican divorce invalid and proceeded to dissolve the marriage in Colorado.
- The trial court found the agreement “extremely” and “grossly unfair” and found husband’s will was overborne by wife’s pressure when he was emotionally fragile.
- Even so, the trial court treated the agreement as a “marital agreement” (because it was executed before the Colorado petition was filed), found it valid, and entered permanent orders that largely followed it, resulting in wife receiving about 91% of the marital property.
- Husband appealed, arguing the agreement was a separation agreement tied to dissolution and therefore subject to stricter statutory review.

## Issues

1. Whether the parties’ notarized property agreement, executed as part of an immediate (though invalid) Mexican divorce process, should be treated as a separation agreement rather than a marital agreement under Colorado dissolution law.
2. Whether the trial court’s use of the marital-agreement framework required reversal of permanent property orders that enforced an agreement the court found grossly unfair and the product of overbearing pressure.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals held the agreement was a separation agreement because it was executed in contemplation of ending the marriage and as part of an intended dissolution process, not as an ordinary during-marriage contract.
- The trial court erred by classifying the agreement as a marital agreement based mainly on the fact that it was signed before the Colorado dissolution case was filed.
- Because the agreement should have been analyzed as a separation agreement, the trial court applied the wrong legal standard when it largely enforced the agreement despite findings of extreme unfairness and compromised voluntariness.
- The permanent property orders were reversed, and the case was remanded for further proceedings consistent with treating and reviewing the agreement as a separation agreement.

## Legal Principles

- Whether an agreement is a separation agreement depends on its purpose and context—whether it was made in contemplation of dissolution and to settle rights incident to divorce—rather than on the date a Colorado petition is filed.
- Separation agreements in dissolution proceedings are subject to judicial review under Colorado’s dissolution statutes, including scrutiny for unconscionability and the circumstances surrounding assent.
- A court cannot avoid the statutory protections applicable to separation agreements by labeling a divorce-related property settlement as a marital agreement and then enforcing materially one-sided terms under a more deferential contract approach.
- When a trial court applies the wrong classification and standard to a divorce-related property agreement, permanent orders based on that error must be reversed and reconsidered under the proper statutory framework.

## Conclusion

In re Marriage of Bisque held that a property agreement executed as part of a mail-order Mexican divorce effort was a separation agreement because it was made in contemplation of dissolution, and the trial court’s timing-based classification as a marital agreement led it to apply the wrong enforceability standard; the Court of Appeals therefore reversed the resulting property division and remanded for review under the separation-agreement framework.


In re Marriage of Bisque, 31 P.3d 175 (2001)