A dramatic legal battle involving country music legend George Jones’s widow, Nancy Jones, has taken a stunning twist. A Nashville man accused of stealing millions of dollars in cash and cryptocurrency from her has now filed a counterlawsuit, claiming the assets were shared investments, not stolen property.
According to court records and reporting by Rolling Stone, 58-year-old Kirk West was arrested last year after authorities charged him with taking $400,000 in cash and more than 5.5 million XRP tokens—valued at over $11 million at the time of the alleged theft—from Nancy Jones.
West and Jones first met in the months after George Jones’s death in 2013. West presented himself as a crypto and investment expert, and the two entered a long-term romantic relationship. Over the years, West allegedly persuaded Nancy to invest large sums of her money into multiple cryptocurrencies, including XRP, Ethereum, Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, and Stellar.
The case took a shocking turn when Nancy discovered last year that a Ledger hardware wallet holding the private keys to her crypto holdings had disappeared from her safe after she asked West to leave her home amid suspicions of infidelity. With the help of lawyers and blockchain analysts, she managed to recover most of the XRP, but about 483,000 XRP—worth over $1 million today—remain missing.
Rather than concede defeat, West filed a civil countersuit, disputing the theft allegations. His complaint argues that the cryptocurrencies and other assets—including gold, silver, and cash—were accumulated through joint investments during their relationship and should be treated as shared property. He is now seeking half of the total holdings.
The lawsuit has ignited widespread interest, not only because of its financial scale—reportedly exceeding $11 million—but also due to the dramatic personal and legal clash between a country music icon’s widow and her former partner. As the civil case proceeds in Williamson County court, observers say it highlights risks associated with personal relationships intersecting with wealth and volatile crypto markets.