Billy Ray Cyrus wins legal battle as judge slams ‘unreasonable’ claim

Father of famous American singer Miley Cyrus, Billy Ray Cyrus has secured a decisive courtroom victory after a judge ordered a woman who claimed to be Miley Cyrus’ biological mother to pay his legal fees.

On Wednesday, a Nashville court ruled that Jayme Lee, an Arizona woman who sued the country singer alleging she is Miley’s real mother, must reimburse Billy Ray for the cost of defending the case.

According to a December 17 court filing obtained by the Daily Mail, the Circuit Court of Davidson County ordered Lee to pay $7,564.13 to the 64-year-old Achy Breaky Heart star.

The court filing stated: "Defendant Billy Ray Cyrus is entitled to the recovery from Plaintiff Jayme Lee of post-judgment interest on the award of his reasonable and necessary attorney fees and costs," adding that the sum would accrue interest at "an interest rate of 9.5 percent per annum."

The judge also dismissed Lee’s complaint with prejudice, meaning it cannot be refiled, and denied her requests to compel maternity and paternity DNA testing.

According to the ruling, "Jayme Lee acted unreasonably in bringing, or refusing to voluntarily withdraw, the dismissed claims."

Billy Ray, a native of Flatwoods, Kentucky, shares five children with ex-wife Tish Cyrus-Purcell, 58.

The former couple, who ended their 27-year marriage in 2022, are parents to daughters Miley, Brandi, 38, and Noah, 25, and sons Trace, 36, and Braison, 31.

Billy Ray adopted Brandi and Trace, whom Tish had during her previous marriage to Baxter Neal Helson.

The Daily Mail reached out to representatives for Billy Ray and Miley for comment.

The publication was the first to reveal details of the explosive lawsuit, in which Lee alleged that she was Miley’s biological mother and that the singer, now 33, had been adopted by Billy Ray and Tish.

After months of attempts to get the family’s attention, Billy Ray publicly responded earlier this month, dismissing the claims as 'false and absurd" and branding them "delusional."

In her original complaint, filed in Tennessee in May, Lee, 45, claimed she gave birth to Miley in 1992, when Lee was just 12 years old, and later entered into a so-called private adoption agreement with Billy Ray and Tish.

She alleged that the arrangement allowed her to choose Miley’s name and remain involved in her life as a nanny and piano teacher.

Court documents obtained by the Daily Mail show Lee accused Billy Ray of having "wrongfully assumed the role" of Miley’s father without her consent and of "misrepresented the circumstances" of the alleged adoption, claiming this caused her "severe emotional distress."

She accused the former couple of breach of contract, fraud, misrepresentation, intentional infliction of emotional distress and unlawful interference with parental rights.

In June, Lee escalated the case with an amended complaint, accusing Billy Ray and Tish of "child abuse and endangerment" for making Miley a public figure and "knowingly placing her in the spotlight."

She further alleged that no valid adoption paperwork existed, arguing that any consent was invalid because she was a minor and therefore "lacked capacity to consent."

Lee also claimed the couple "cut off all contact" with her and "threatened [her] with police action" after Miley was born.

In one passage of the amended complaint, she wrote: "At 12, in 1992, I was trying to find a lawyer to help me get visitation of Miley but I was brutally attacked and placed in a state of trauma until recently remembering how I came to be the parent of Miley."

She asked the court to order supervised DNA testing and to "revisit the legality of the adoption" depending on the results.

The lawsuit took increasingly bizarre turns. Lee attempted to serve court summonses on Tish in June and Billy Ray in November, requested a trial that was denied in October, and even tried to add Dolly Parton, Miley’s godmothe, as a defendant.

She claimed the country music legend had "direct and material knowledge of facts concerning the concealment of the true parentage and adoption status" of Miley.

Other high-profile names were also dragged into the filing, with Lee listing Julia Roberts, Hillary Clinton, Sharon Osbourne and Neil Patrick Harris as supposed "eyewitnesses."

She even subpoenaed Taylor Swift on November 13, demanding the return of an alleged scrapbook Lee claimed to have made for Miley when she was 12.

Billy Ray formally responded on November 20 by filing a motion to dismiss all claims, arguing that Lee’s allegations were "false and absurd" and "clearly brought for the purposes of harassing" him and his family while "needlessly wasting this Court's time and resources."

His legal team also noted that Tennessee law does not allow adoption without a court order and pointed out that Lee’s claims fell far outside the state’s statutes of limitations.

On December 1, Billy Ray opposed Lee’s amended complaint, stating he had never been properly served and had only recently learned of the lawsuit. He requested recovery of his attorney’s fees if the case was dismissed.

In a statement to the Daily Mail, his attorney Chase LanCarte confirmed the final outcome: "The Court dismissed the lawsuit with prejudice this morning and awarded Mr Cyrus the recovery of his reasonable and necessary attorney's fees and costs."

Billy Ray and Tish were married from 1993 to 2022 and welcomed Miley, born Destiny Hope Cyrus, in November 1992. They later had Braison in 1994 and Noah in January 2000.

Billy Ray also has a son, Christopher Cody Cyrus, born in 1992 from a previous relationship with Kristin Luckey.

Following their divorce, both moved on quickly. Billy Ray became engaged to Australian singer Firerose, who is 27 years younger, in November 2022.

They married in October 2023, but he filed for divorce just seven months later. Tish, meanwhile, confirmed her relationship with Prison Break actor Dominic Purcell in late 2022. The couple married in August 2023 at Miley’s Malibu home.