Justin Baldoni suffers huge blow in $400m Blake Lively lawsuit in major update
Justin Baldoni's $400m lawsuit against It Ends With Us co-star Blake Lively has been dismissed, according to reports. The legal debate kicked off following Blake and Justin's time working together on the film, that was released last summer.
Blake initially launched a sexual harassment lawsuit against Justin - who has strongly refuted the claims. However, he hit back with a $400million defamation claim against her, her publicist and husband Ryan Reynolds, all of whom have dismissed the accusations.
Additionally, Justin launched a $250 million libel case against the New York Times over their coverage of Blake's allegations. However, the $400million lawsuit has reportedly now been dismissed.
A spokesperson for Blake told the Daily Mail: "Today's opinion is a total victory and a complete vindication for Blake Lively, along with those that Justin Baldoni and the Wayfarer Parties dragged into their retaliatory lawsuit, including Ryan Reynolds, Leslie Sloane and The New York Times.
"As we have said from day one, this '$400 million' lawsuit was a sham, and the Court saw right through it. We look forward to the next round, which is seeking attorneys' fees, treble damages and punitive damages against Baldoni, Sarowitz, Nathan, and the other Wayfarer Parties who perpetrated this abusive litigation."
Last month, Blake's pal Taylor Swift was dragged into the scandal when she was officially subpoenaed to appear as a witness. The pop star was delivered a legal notice by Justin's lawyer Bryan Freedman - a decision which had been slammed by her team as a tactic to create clickbait.
In a move that appeared to please Blake and Taylor, it was confirmed Justin would no longer be calling on the Bad Blood hitmaker to appear as a witness. Bryan Freedman had claimed Blake had called on "her high-profile friends" including Taylor to "manipulate Justin at every turn."
Taylor, who is close friends with Blake, licensed her hit song My Tears Ricochet to be used in the film but was not involved in the making of It Ends With Us, said her reps.
They slammed the subpoena, claiming it was "designed to use Taylor Swift 's name to draw public interest by creating tabloid clickbait instead of focusing on the facts of the case."
Justin's legal team dropped the subpoena last month, as Blake's spokesperson said they were "pleased" with the decision. 'We supported the efforts of Taylor's team to quash these inappropriate subpoenas directed to her counsel, and we will continue to stand up for any third party who is unjustly harassed or threatened in the process,' they told People.
'The Baldoni and Wayfarer team have tried to put Taylor Swift, a woman who has been an inspiration for tens of millions across the globe, at the center of this case since day one,' they claimed.
They alleged that 'exploiting Taylor Swift's celebrity was the original plan in [PR professional] Melissa Nathan's scenario planning document, and it continues to this day.'
'Faced with having to justify themselves in federal court, they folded. At some point they will run out of distractions from the actual claims of sexual harassment and retaliation they are facing,' they said.
The Mirror has contacted Justin's representative for comment.
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Belfast Telegraph
3 hours ago
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3 hours ago
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US District Court Judge Lewis Liman's decision is the latest development in the bitter legal battle surrounding the dark romantic drama that includes Lively suing Baldoni in late December. Baldoni and production company Wayfarer Studios countersued in January for 400 million dollars (£294.9 million), accusing Lively and her husband, Deadpool actor Ryan Reynolds, of defamation and extortion. The judge ruled that Baldoni cannot sue Lively for defamation over claims she made in her lawsuit, because allegations made in a lawsuit are exempt from libel claims. Judge Liman also ruled that Baldoni's claims that Lively stole creative control of the film did not count as extortion under California law. While Lively was accused in the lawsuit of threatening to refuse to promote the film, Wayfarer does 'not allege facts showing that Lively had an obligation to promote the film or to approve marketing materials', Judge Liman wrote. Baldoni's legal team can revise the lawsuit if it wants to pursue different claims related to whether Lively breached a contract, the judge said. It Ends With Us, an adaptation of Colleen Hoover's bestselling 2016 novel that begins as a romance but takes a dark turn into domestic violence, was released in August, exceeding box office expectations with a 50 million dollar (£36.8 million) debut. But the film's release was shrouded by speculation over discord between Lively and Baldoni. The judge also dismissed Baldoni's defamation lawsuit against The New York Times, which had reported on Lively's sexual harassment allegations. 'Today's opinion is a total victory and a complete vindication for Blake Lively, along with those that Justin Baldoni and the Wayfarer Parties dragged into their retaliatory lawsuit, including Ryan Reynolds, (publicist) Leslie Sloane and The New York Times,' Lively's lawyers, Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb, said in a prepared statement. The lawyers said they 'look forward to the next round' of seeking lawyers' fees, treble damages and punitive damages. Lively appeared in the 2005 film The Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants and the TV series Gossip Girl from 2007 to 2012 before starring in films including The Town and The Shallows. Baldoni starred in the TV comedy Jane The Virgin, directed the 2019 film Five Feet Apart and wrote Man Enough, a book challenging traditional notions of masculinity.
