The Moment
In a plotline straight out of a daytime talk show, Billy Ray Cyrus has shut down a lawsuit from a woman claiming she is Miley Cyrus’ biological mother.
The woman, identified in court documents as Jayme Lee, alleged she gave birth to Miley at 12 years old and entered into a secret “private adoption agreement” with Billy Ray and Miley’s mom, Tish. She claimed she was promised a role in Miley’s life as her nanny and piano teacher, and said she suffered severe emotional distress when those alleged promises weren’t kept.
Lee’s suit accused Billy Ray and Tish of breach of contract, fraud, emotional distress, and interference with parental rights. She also pushed for court-ordered DNA testing on Miley and her parents and wanted the legality of the supposed adoption revisited.
But a judge denied her request for a trial this fall. Billy Ray, 64, then moved to dismiss all of Lee’s claims, accusing her of filing the case simply to harass his family, according to summaries of the filings in entertainment press coverage from May through December 2025.
On December 5, Billy Ray’s attorney said the court dismissed the lawsuit with prejudice-meaning it can’t just be refiled-and even ordered that he could recover his attorney’s fees and costs. Billy Ray has publicly called the allegations “false and absurd.” Representatives for Billy Ray, Tish, and Miley have so far declined to comment further.
Billy Ray Cyrus responds to woman claiming she’s Miley Cyrus’ biological mother in lawsuit https://t.co/CEfBk6GP0g pic.twitter.com/kgom3UmV9n
— Page Six (@PageSix) December 8, 2025
The Take
I’ll be honest: this one lands at the intersection of heartbreaking and bizarre.
On one hand, you have a very serious claim: a woman saying she gave birth at 12, alleging a secret adoption, and saying she was pushed out of a child’s life. That’s not tabloid fluff; that’s heavy. On the other hand, a judge reviewed it, denied a trial, and then dismissed the case with prejudice. Legally, this is about as close to a full stop as you get in civil court.
And yet, in the court of public opinion, stories like this tend to live forever. We’ve seen it with celebrity “secret kids,” “hidden siblings,” and all the wild conspiracies floating around online. Add the Cyrus family-already a magnet for headlines thanks to divorce drama, estrangements, and reconciliations-and you’ve got rocket fuel for internet rumor culture.
This case feels like a real-life paternity episode that never even got past the theme song. A woman made sweeping claims about one of the most famous pop stars in the world; the court essentially said, “No, ma’am,” and sent everyone home-with a bill for the side that filed.
What I keep coming back to is this: Miley didn’t file this, Miley didn’t ask for this, and Miley doesn’t appear to have participated in it at all. Yet it’s her baby photos, her origin story, and her family tree getting turned into a public guessing game. Fame means your childhood becomes public property… and apparently, so does your birth certificate.
At a time when Billy Ray and Miley have reportedly only recently begun thawing a years-long estrangement-he publicly congratulated her on her engagement to musician Maxx Morando-this kind of lawsuit is the last thing that family needed. Legal closure is one thing; emotional fallout is another.
Receipts
Confirmed:
- A woman named Jayme Lee filed a civil lawsuit in May 2025 claiming she is Miley Cyrus’ biological mother and alleging a “private adoption agreement” with Billy Ray and Tish.
- Lee accused them of breach of contract, fraud, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and interference with parental rights, and requested supervised DNA testing for Miley and her parents.
- A judge denied Lee’s request for a trial in October 2025, according to summaries of the court actions in entertainment reporting.
- On November 20, Billy Ray filed a motion to dismiss the case, saying the lawsuit was brought to harass him and his family.
- On December 5, 2025, the lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice, and the court awarded Billy Ray recovery of his reasonable attorney’s fees and costs, per a statement from his attorney reported in the same coverage.
- Billy Ray has publicly described Lee’s allegations as “false and absurd.”
- Billy Ray and Tish are the legal parents of Miley Cyrus and share three biological children together: Miley, Braison, and Noah; Billy Ray also adopted Tish’s older children, Brandi and Trace, from a previous marriage.
- In a recent public Instagram post, Billy Ray congratulated Miley on her engagement to Maxx Morando, signing off as “love Dad.”
Unverified / Alleged (not backed by the court):
- Lee’s claim that she gave birth to Miley at age 12.
- Her allegation of a secret “private adoption agreement” involving promises that she could name Miley and work as her nanny and piano teacher.
- Her allegation that Billy Ray and Tish cut off contact and threatened her with police action after Miley’s birth.
The court’s dismissal with prejudice and award of attorney’s fees strongly signals that the judge did not find legal merit in Lee’s claims, but that is not the same as a detailed factual ruling on every allegation.
Backstory (For Casual Readers)
If you haven’t kept up since the Hannah Montana days: Billy Ray Cyrus is a country singer best known for “Achy Breaky Heart,” and he played Miley’s TV dad on her breakout Disney show. Miley grew from child star to Grammy-winning pop powerhouse who now lives in a much more adult, rock-pop lane. Her parents, Billy Ray and Tish, have had a long, on-and-off marriage that eventually ended in divorce, followed by a swirl of family rifts, new relationships, and public reconciliation hints. Reports have suggested that Billy Ray and Miley were estranged for a stretch, which is why his recent enthusiastic engagement shout-out to her-and this lawsuit arriving on top of all that-raised extra eyebrows.
What’s Next
Legally, this chapter appears closed. A dismissal with prejudice plus attorney’s fees is the court’s way of slamming the door, not just gently closing it. Barring some unusual appeal or brand-new evidence, there’s no obvious path for this same set of claims to come roaring back.
What stays open is the public narrative. Will Billy Ray or Miley ever address this directly, beyond attorney statements? They may choose the smartest move of all: silence. When your family has already been through a decade of divorce headlines and estrangement rumors, feeding another conspiracy theory is probably low on the to-do list.
The bigger question is how long fans and casual observers keep replaying this story. Celebrity families have always attracted wild rumors, but the combination of social media and legal filings makes it easier than ever for fringe claims to get mainstream attention-at least for a news cycle or two.
For now, the receipts say this: the court sided firmly with Billy Ray, Miley’s official parents remain Billy Ray and Tish, and the woman who claimed otherwise walked away not with a new family, but with a dismissed case.
Sources: Civil lawsuit filings and dismissal as summarized in entertainment news reports (May-Dec. 2025); public Instagram post by Billy Ray Cyrus congratulating Miley on her engagement (2025).
Your turn: When a court throws out a case this hard, do you think celebrities should still address the accusations publicly, or is saying nothing the healthiest move?
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