From King v. Brown, decided Friday by Kentucky Court of Appeals Judge Sara Walter Combs, joined by Judges Glenn Acree and Jacqueline Caldwell:
Appellant, Kelly King (King), appeals from the entry of an Interpersonal Protective Order (IPO) against her [on the petition by] Kendra Brown, … a former partner in a relationship.
Brown … filed a petition for order of protection against King, a former partner in a relationship. The petition alleged that King had been asked multiple times not to contact Brown; that King had used her large social media following to spread and to elicit hate speech toward Brown; that there was a separate, ongoing harassment investigation case; that in March 2022, King followed Brown out of a bar and threw a drink on her; that in November 2022, King trespassed on Brown’s property and refused to leave until police arrived; that on November 1, 2023, King recorded Brown while jogging and made a harassing TikTok; that in May 2024, King showed up at the funeral of Brown’s grandmother despite repeated pleas for no contact; that in September 2025, King recorded and posted a video on TikTok of her (King’s) fiancée “licking and rubbing” on Brown’s car. Brown stated that she feared for her safety in light of King’s numerous attempts to contact and harass her—as well as King’s criminal history.
The trial court entered an order that provided, among other things,
In order to assist in eliminating future acts of domestic violence and abuse, dating violence and abuse, stalking or sexual assault, No Post on social media referencing Ms. Brown, “Ex” or using her name in any likeness or property…. No 3rd party, social media or electronic contact.
The trial court’s findings stated:
Clear from the testimony and evidence that this was a violent and tumultuous relationship and there were multiple physical altercations….
There were additional acts or threats of violence that occurred in public at the hands of Ms. King as testified to by Ms. Brown and witnesses including holding her over a railing in a bar to the point that Ms. Brown was concerned she would fall, throwing drinks on her and her friends or acquaintances, thumping or hitting her in the head with the [sic] a balled finger and getting into a physical fight with someone that Ms. Brown was associating with in a bar in front of Ms. Brown, following her and a friend to her house and barging in. These all seem to be surrounding times when Ms. Brown states she would attempt to leave the relationship or spend time with other friends away from Ms. King…. [The] Court finds Ms. Brown’s testimony credible and that these additional acts or threats of violence did occur. This certainly would place Ms. Brown in imminent fear of physical injury ….
Ms. King has shown up to Ms. Brown’s home on multiple occasions and while Ms. Brown was again generally cordial, she did tell Ms. King to leave and on the second such occasion had to call the police to [sic] Ms. King to leave. This is consistent with Ms. Brown filing for an order of protection after these events in November of 2022 which was denied by the reviewing Court at that time.
And the trial court added this about King’s social media commentary about Brown:
Ms. King has a history of creating social media content specifically about Ms. Brown and her [King’s] other exes….
Since this relationship … has ended, Ms. King has engaged in significant tik tok activity regarding Ms. Brown as well. While she never directly uses Ms. Brown’s name, her videos include pictures of Ms. Brown and her new paramour, videos of Ms. Brown running in her neighborhood, tik tok lives specifically about this case and hearings, and made a video … of her [King’s] partner licking and rubbing on Ms. Brown’s car two years after the end of the relationship.
All of these videos which include Ms. Brown’s likeness refer to Ms. Brown as “the ex.” She [King] then makes numerous vaguely threatening posts or posts complaining about “the ex” or “exes” generally which are threatening and angry in nature including at least one where she references a serial kill and shows a chainsaw in the back of her car and one where she lists as her favorite activities are harassing exes on Tik Tok. These posts have solicited responses from her numerous followers some including things like “we will help bury the bodies.”
Ms. King states that all of this was just her expressing her first amendment right and no reasonable person would find this to be a threat to their physical safety. However, the Court finds it telling that Ms. King’s paramour expressly stated they would not have made the video of the car if Ms. Brown or others were present in the parking lot, and they would never encourage a group of people to surround and watch them do this or harass Ms. Brown and bully her. However, Ms. King posted this to a public tik tok account with over 100 thousand followers which did in fact solicit harmful and threatening comments about Ms. Brown. One does not get to do behind a computer what they know to be harmful and threatening if done in person.
Ms. King’s paramour also specifically states that this is Ms. King’s “niche” online and that she has culminated [sic] this following due to her being real and authentic and sharing her real and authentic experiences and feelings. One does not get to claim their online self is real and authentic and then claim the threatening behavior they demonstrate is not real and should not intimidate the people it is directed at.
While this Court respect’s [sic] Ms. King’s free speech, you can’t create and exploit a social media persona that you claim to be “real and authentic” and centers around you being a jilted and potentially violent person obsessively angry with your exes, looking for revenge or retribution and then claim your exes should not fear that you are in fact a violent and jilted ex who continues to be obsessively angry and potentially violent towards them. Especially not when you have, in fact, been physically violent during the relationship towards that person.
Therefor [sic] the Court believes that an Order is necessary to protect against ongoing acts or threats of DV.
The appellate court upheld the order, rejecting defendant’s First Amendment argument:
[King argues] that the family court imposed an unconstitutional prior restraint and failed to make sufficient findings to determine whether King’s social media posts are protected by the First Amendment. We disagree. See Wedding v. Harmon (Ky. App. 2016) (Where family court entered order prohibiting father from sending emails about parties’ divorce and parenting matters, this Court rejected father’s prior restraint argument and held that emails were constitutionally-unprotected conduct intended to harass, annoy, or alarm mother; injunction was narrowly drawn and best interests of children were supported by limitation on the father’s speech.).
In the case before us, the family court made sufficient findings as set forth above. Substantial evidence supports those findings. The court did not believe King’s testimony that she believed her TikToks were constitutionally protected speech. The court explained that King cannot claim that her social media persona—as a jilted, potentially violent, and obsessively angry ex—is real and authentic, and then reverse that assertion and claim that the threatening behavior she demonstrates is not real—especially in light of King’s violence towards Brown during their relationship…..
Jennifer McVay Martin Lexington represents Brown.
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