Leisha Pickering, estranged wife of former U.S. Rep. Chip Pickering, has filed a lawsuit in Mississippi against her husband’s alleged mistress. The suit seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages against Elizabeth Creekmore Byrd for alienation of affection. The entire Complaint is available at TPM – Talking Points Memo.

The lawsuit says Chip Pickering and Creekmore Byrd dated in college but that they later reconnected after the Pickerings were married and began having an affair. The affair commenced while Pickering was in Congress and living in Washington, D.C. during the week.

Pickering was elected to Congress in 1996 and retired from public service in January 2009. He is now a Washington lobbyist for Capitol Resources, LLC. Among Capitol Resources’ clients is Cellular South, a company owned by Byrd’s family.

Leisha Pickering’s lawsuit says alleges that Chip Pickering declined an offer to take Senator Trent Lott’s Senate seat when Lott resigned in December 2007 due to pressure from Byrd. She contends that Byrd told Chip Pickering that their relationship could not continue if he became a senator because he would have to stay married.

Creekmore Byrd and her husband, Dr. Douglas Byrd, married in 1990 and separated in June 2006. In August 2007, Chip Pickering announced that he would not seek re-election. A few months later, the Byrds’ divorce was finalized. In June 2008, Chip Pickering filed for divorce. That case is still pending.

An alienation of affection lawsuit is a very old legal concept based on the idea that someone can be sued for interfering with the marriage contract between two others. Essentially, a spouse can sue a third party if his or her spouse physically and/or emotionally abandons the marriage for that third party.

In order to prove a claim of alienation of affection, the plaintiff will have to prove that the spouses loved each other, that their love was alienated and destroyed and that the third party’s conduct was maliciously intended to interfere with a legal marriage relationship.

Most states in the United States have abolished the alienation of affection cause of action. Forty-three states and the District of Columbia have either repealed alienation of affection statutes or have abolished the claim judicially through court cases. Only Hawaii, Illinois, Mississippi, New Hampshire, New Mexico, South Dakota and Utah still allow such suits.

Also See:

• Wife of Florida Congressman Files for Divorce After Adultery Scandal
• Nevada Governor Gibbons Divorcing