Former professional football star and hall-of-fame player Deion Sanders — nicknamed Neon Deion and Prime Time — openly cultivated and firmly grabbed headlines during his playing days. Now, in their aftermath, and despite his desire to strike a low-profile pose in at least one aspect of his life, the headlines continue to follow him.
The persistent media glare relates to Sanders’ family woes, most specifically his 2011 divorce from his wife of 14 years, Pilar, and all the assorted issues that have shaken out from it. Sanders and his former spouse have had a longstanding child custody dispute, with a judge just last week giving Deion Sanders primary conservatorship of the couple’s three children.
A central focus of the couple’s persistent sparring is the prenuptial agreement they executed prior to marriage, which stipulated a $1 million payout to Pilar in the event of a divorce. A Texas court has upheld that agreement.
Pilar seeks to contest it, saying that it is flawed and that she intends to appeal the court’s decision. She states that she deserves half of Sanders’ wealth, which has been estimated at close to $250 million.
Pilar Sanders’ attorney says that she will provide new evidence from a witness who will testify that Deion Sanders himself thought that the premarital contract was defective and actively sought to unlawfully hide his assets from his ex-spouse. That evidence reportedly will feature testimony that Sanders solicited the assistance of a prominent clergyman in shielding his assets.
Sanders’ legal counsel says that the matter is definitively closed, noting that an appellate court is limited to considering only existing evidence that was at issue in the prior decision and is not entitled to entertain newly introduced evidence that surfaced following a legal ruling.
Source: New York Post, “No end zone for Deion Sanders divorce war,” March 25, 2013