What was the verdict for kody and robun brown
Executive summary
The Browns did not face a criminal conviction: a local criminal investigation into Kody Brown and his wives was opened after their show aired and later dropped, and their federal civil challenge produced a favorable district-court ruling but was ultimately dismissed on appeal for lack of standing, leaving no final merits verdict in their favor or against them [1] [2] [3]. In short: criminal probes were abandoned and the constitutional challenge was resolved on procedural—not substantive—grounds at the appellate level [1] [3].
1. The criminal investigation opened and was later discontinued
After Sister Wives premiered in 2010, local authorities in Lehi, Utah, announced an investigation into possible bigamy and polygamy involving Kody Brown and his wives, with press accounts noting potential felony exposure, including statutes that carried heavy penalties under Utah law [1]. That criminal inquiry did not lead to prosecution: reporting and case summaries state that the criminal case against the Browns was dropped on June 1, 2012, meaning there was no criminal trial verdict against Kody or Robyn Brown stemming from that investigation [1].
2. The Browns’ federal lawsuit won at district court but lost on appeal
The Browns filed a federal constitutional challenge to Utah’s polygamy statutes and prevailed in the U.S. District Court in 2013, a decision that briefly looked like a substantive victory for their claim that the law violated their rights [2]. However, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit later reviewed the matter and concluded the district court should not have reached the merits because, after a change in Utah County prosecutors’ policy, the Browns no longer presented a live Article III case or controversy; the Tenth Circuit therefore dismissed the case on standing grounds in 2016 [3] [2].
3. What “dismissed on standing grounds” means for the final outcome
A dismissal for lack of standing means the appellate court did not rule on whether Utah’s anti-polygamy law is constitutional or unconstitutional; instead the court held the plaintiffs lacked a lawsuit that a federal court could adjudicate given changed enforcement policy, so there was no substantive appellate verdict for or against the Browns on the merits of polygamy laws [3] [2]. Consequently, the district court’s favorable ruling did not survive as a binding, final resolution because the appeals court removed the case from merits consideration [2] [3].
4. The practical reality: no criminal convictions, and no final merits decision
Taken together, the public record shows no criminal conviction of Kody or Robyn Brown arising from the initial investigation—the criminal case was dropped in 2012—and no definitive federal court ruling that declared Utah’s polygamy statute unlawful on the merits because the appeal ended in dismissal for lack of standing in 2016 [1] [3] [2]. This dual outcome—abandoned criminal proceedings and a procedural appellate dismissal—left the Browns without either criminal penalties or a durable judicial victory overturning the law [1] [2].
5. Alternate perspectives, motivations, and reporting limits
Advocates for the Browns framed the litigation as an effort to secure equal treatment for consensual plural families, while state and local officials emphasized limited prosecutorial resources and a focus on serious offenses like child abuse or trafficking when deciding whether to pursue polygamy cases, a policy shift that factored into the standing analysis [1] [3]. Reporting in the provided sources does not cover any subsequent legal developments after the Tenth Circuit’s 2016 dismissal or any secret prosecutorial decisions, so conclusions are limited to the documented timeline through that appellate ruling and the dropped criminal case [3] [1] [2].