Latest news with #BoiesSchillerFlexner
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Justin Baldoni's $400 million lawsuit in jeopardy after reporter admits texting mistake
Justin Baldoni's $400 million defamation lawsuit against Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds and publicist Leslie Sloane may be in jeopardy because of a journalist's text message using the wrong choice of words. Baldoni's filing largely centered on a text sent by a reporter claiming that Sloane said Lively was 'sexually assaulted' by Baldoni. His legal team cited the 'unsubstantiated accusation' as evidence that Sloane pushed a 'false narrative' to 'destroy Baldoni and his reputation.' The journalist who sent the text in question, identified as Daily Mail reporter James Vituscka, has since come forward and clarified the message, admitting that he used those words in error. 'In those text messages, my use of the phrase 'sexually assaulted' was a mistake. I meant to say, 'sexually harassed.' I regret this error,' Vituscka says, according to a signed declaration shared with the Daily News on Friday by law firm Boies Schiller Flexner, which is representing Sloane. 'Ms. Sloane never told me that Ms. Lively was sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by Justin Baldoni or anyone else,' Vituscka says. 'I regret that private text messages were made public.' What's more, Vituscka's text — which he claims he did not authorize to be used in Baldoni's filing — was 'not in reference to any conversation that I had with Leslie Sloane' but to the allegations made in the complaint Lively filed against Baldoni in mid-December, he says. In the initial complaint filed with the California Civil Rights Department, the 'Gossip Girl' star, 37, accused her 41-year-old 'It Ends With Us' director of sexual harassment on the film's set and a retaliatory smear campaign. She formally sued Baldoni at the end of the year. Two weeks later, Baldoni filed his countersuit, accusing Lively, Reynolds and Sloane of defamation and civil extortion. In part using that message from Vituscka, his lawyers claimed Baldoni was targeted in a 'character assassination plot' orchestrated by Sloane at 'Lively's direction.' Sloane has maintained that said she never used the phrase 'sexually assaulted,' and has sought to be dismissed from the case. 'After being wrongfully dragged into this litigation, Leslie Sloane has repeatedly stated that she never used the phrase 'sexually assaulted' which formed the basis of Baldoni's meritless defamation claim against her and today she is fully vindicated by the declaration of James Vituscka that admits she never said those words,' attorney Sigrid McCawley said in a statement sent to The New York Daily News. 'The Wayfarer Parties never even bothered to attempt to confirm whether the outrageous allegations they were launching at Ms. Sloane were true, and they were not.' Legal teams for Lively and Baldoni did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Justin Baldoni's $400 million lawsuit in jeopardy after reporter admits texting mistake
Justin Baldoni's $400 million defamation lawsuit against Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds and publicist Leslie Sloane may be in jeopardy because of a journalist's text message using the wrong choice of words. Baldoni's filing largely centered on a text sent by a reporter claiming that Sloane said Lively was 'sexually assaulted' by Baldoni. His legal team cited the 'unsubstantiated accusation' as evidence that Sloane pushed a 'false narrative' to 'destroy Baldoni and his reputation.' The journalist who sent the text in question, identified as Daily Mail reporter James Vituscka, has since come forward and clarified the message, admitting that he used those words in error. 'In those text messages, my use of the phrase 'sexually assaulted' was a mistake. I meant to say, 'sexually harassed.' I regret this error,' Vituscka says, according to a signed declaration shared with the Daily News on Friday by law firm Boies Schiller Flexner, which is representing Sloane. 'Ms. Sloane never told me that Ms. Lively was sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by Justin Baldoni or anyone else,' Vituscka says. 'I regret that private text messages were made public.' What's more, Vituscka's text — which he claims he did not authorize to be used in Baldoni's filing — was 'not in reference to any conversation that I had with Leslie Sloane' but to the allegations made in the complaint Lively filed against Baldoni in mid-December, he says. In the initial complaint filed with the California Civil Rights Department, the 'Gossip Girl' star, 37, accused her 41-year-old 'It Ends With Us' director of sexual harassment on the film's set and a retaliatory smear campaign. She formally sued Baldoni at the end of the year. Two weeks later, Baldoni filed his countersuit, accusing Lively, Reynolds and Sloane of defamation and civil extortion. In part using that message from Vituscka, his lawyers claimed Baldoni was targeted in a 'character assassination plot' orchestrated by Sloane at 'Lively's direction.' Sloane has maintained that said she never used the phrase 'sexually assaulted,' and has sought to be dismissed from the case. 'After being wrongfully dragged into this litigation, Leslie Sloane has repeatedly stated that she never used the phrase 'sexually assaulted' which formed the basis of Baldoni's meritless defamation claim against her and today she is fully vindicated by the declaration of James Vituscka that admits she never said those words,' attorney Sigrid McCawley said in a statement sent to The New York Daily News. 'The Wayfarer Parties never even bothered to attempt to confirm whether the outrageous allegations they were launching at Ms. Sloane were true, and they were not.' Legal teams for Lively and Baldoni did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Yahoo
7 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Daily Mail Reporter Subpoenaed by Blake Lively's Publicist Says He Mistakenly Used the Phrase ‘Sexually Assaulted'
A Daily Mail reporter admitted to wrongfully characterizing Blake Lively's claims of sexual harassment as sexual assault on the set of 'It Ends With Us' in a declaration filed Thursday. As the Lively-Baldoni legal plot thickens, reporter James Vituscka was subpoenaed by lawyers for Lively's publicist Leslie Sloane to turn over text messages in which he incorrectly framed the 'Gossip Girl' star's sexual harassment claims as assault. 'In those text messages, my use of the phrase 'sexually assaulted' was a mistake. I meant to say, 'sexually harassed.' I regret this error,' Vituscka's declaration read. 'Ms. Sloane never told me that Ms. Lively was sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by Justin Baldoni or anyone else.' Representatives for Sloane said that after being 'wrongfully dragged into this litigation' the Daily Mail reporter's statement fully vindicates the publicist. 'Leslie Sloane has repeatedly stated that she never used the phrase 'sexually assaulted' which formed the basis of Baldoni's meritless defamation claim against her and today she is fully vindicated by the declaration of James Vituscka that admits she never said those words,' Sigrid McCawley, managing partner of Boies Schiller Flexner, said in a statement obtained by TheWrap. 'The declaration also makes clear that the Wayfarer Parties never even bothered to attempt to confirm whether the outrageous allegations they were launching at Ms. Sloane were true and they were not,' the statement continued. Sloane's representatives continued to characterize the text messages as the Wayfarer team's attempts to 'ruin Ms. Sloane's reputation with this vicious and wrongful attack and she has consistently told the truth and justice has prevailed.' On Tuesday, a judge granted Lively's request to remove claims of emotional distress from her legal action against her 'It Ends With Us' co-star and director Justin Baldoni. Judge Lewis Liman denied Baldoni's motion to compel because 'the parties have agreed to dismiss Ms. Lively's 10th and 11th causes of action' without prejudice, meaning the court 'will preclude Lively from offering any evidence of emotional distress' in the future. The post Daily Mail Reporter Subpoenaed by Blake Lively's Publicist Says He Mistakenly Used the Phrase 'Sexually Assaulted' appeared first on TheWrap.
Forbes
30-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
New Lawsuits Allege Companies Conspired To Secretly Pocket Class Action Payouts
The new lawsuit accuses the companies that manage class action payouts and the banks that hold the settlement funds of conspiracy and fraud, among other charges. Getty Prominent attorney David Boies and his firm Boies Schiller Flexner filed three lawsuits this week alleging that at least five companies handling payouts for class action settlements conspired to secretly pocket bank interest payments and award each other business outside the view of attorneys and judges. The suit says the scheme has resulted in lower class action payouts for consumers. The firm filed the suit against claims administration companies Angeion, Epiq and JND Legal Administration, three firms that were also the subject of a recent lawsuit accusing them of taking secret payments from fintech companies. The Boies suit also named Huntington and Western Alliance, the two leading custodial banks for class action lawsuits, as defendants. Boies filed the case in three different federal courts: the Northern District of California, the Southern District of New York and the Southern District of Florida. The charges are numerous and include allegations of conspiracy, fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment and unfair competition. (The multiple filings, with different plaintiffs, may be an attempt to position the Boies firm to be the lead counsel in any multidistrict class action that is certified.) The allegations are part of a troubling pattern in class action payouts that Forbes reported on last week in an in-depth article about the companies quietly pocketing class action payouts. In statements to Forbes, representatives from Angeion and JND denied the allegations of the new suit, calling them 'baseless.' A spokesperson for Western Alliance called them 'false' and 'full of inaccuracies.' Huntington declined to comment, and Epiq didn't respond to our request for comment. Have a story tip? Contact Jeff Kauflin at jkauflin@ or on Signal at jeff.273. Here's how the money in class action payouts moves: When a lawsuit is settled, a judge appoints a claims administration company to handle the distribution of funds to consumers. The administrators also choose a bank to house the money before it's distributed. These deposits can total hundreds of millions of dollars in a large case, and since it can take months or years for the money to be paid out, the funds can earn millions of dollars in interest while sitting idle. Most settlement agreements dictate that any interest earned on the settlement funds should go to the consumers harmed by the company being sued, but the new Boies suit alleges that claims administrators, instead of giving all the interest to the class members, 'demanded that they be given a cut of the profits.' If the banks said no, the administrators threatened to take the lucrative deposits elsewhere. 'The Administrator Defendants agreed with each other that they would implement such a scheme, and each of them proceeded to act accordingly, in concert with one another,' the suit says. The filed complaint gives examples of eight class action suits, including the $119 million Capital One data breach and the $117 million Yahoo! data breach, where the interest rate paid to class members was less than 0.5% despite market rates then being between 4% and 6%. The suit says that, according to former employees at Huntington and Western Alliance, the banks paid to claims administrators 'at minimum, the difference between the market rate on an interest bearing account and the interest that the Bank Defendants paid to the class members.' The banks would 'deposit the kickbacks into [special purpose entities] separately created by the Administrator Defendants to hide the scheme.' None of these payments were ever reported to a judge, the suit says, despite the fact that claims administrators are required to submit a proposal outlining all of their services and costs and get them approved by a judge before a payout begins. One topic the Boies lawsuit doesn't address is the rebates that fintech companies have paid to settlement administrators in exchange for hiring them to distribute class action payouts through digital prepaid cards, which Forbes covered in our reporting last week. Boies Schiller Flexner declined to comment.
Time of India
22-05-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Google defeats Rumble's antitrust lawsuit over video sharing market
HighlightsAlphabet's Google successfully had a lawsuit from video platform Rumble dismissed due to being filed outside the four-year statute of limitations for antitrust claims. Rumble alleged that Google engaged in anticompetitive practices by favoring its YouTube platform in user searches and preventing Rumble from being preinstalled on certain Android devices. Rumble, which reported an average of 59 million global monthly active users in early 2025, has expanded its legal team to include prominent litigator David Boies. By Mike Scarcella Alphabet's Google has persuaded a federal judge in California to reject a lawsuit from video platform Rumble accusing the technology giant of illegally monopolizing the online video-sharing market . In a ruling on Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Haywood Gilliam Jr said Rumble's 2021 lawsuit seeking more than $2 billion in damages was untimely filed outside the four-year statute of limitations for antitrust claims. Rumble accused Google of violating antitrust law by rigging user searches to give preference to Google's YouTube platform over Rumble. The lawsuit also accused Google of scheming with device makers to bar Rumble from being preinstalled on some Android phones. Google had no immediate comment, and Rumble did not immediately respond to a request for one. At the heart of its case, Rumble said there was "considerable direct evidence" that Google illegally was "self-referencing" its YouTube platform in web searches. Rumble claimed it lost out on billions of video views on its platform. Google has denied Rumble's claims and had urged Gilliam to end the case before trial, which was set for July. Gilliam said Rumble failed to present evidence allowing a jury to find and apply an exception to the statute of limitations. The judge criticized Rumble for presenting "bare attorney argument lacking any evidentiary support." Rumble, founded in 2013, had an average of 59 million global monthly active users in the first quarter of 2025, the company said this month. The platform had recently expanded its trial team to include prominent litigator David Boies of law firm Boies Schiller Flexner. Rumble separately is suing Google over its digital advertising practices . The lawsuit, filed last year in California, accused the company of anticompetitive conduct relating to online advertising. Google has called Rumble's claims in that case "simply wrong" and said Rumble uses "dozens" of competing ad services in addition to Google's ad manager. Google faces other antitrust allegations by the U.S. government and groups of states that are challenging the company's dominance in digital advertising and search markets. Google has denied the allegations in those cases. The case is Rumble v. Google, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, No. 4:21-cv-00229. For Rumble: Nicholas Gravante, Philip Iovieno and Danielle Tully of Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft; David Boies of Boies Schiller Flexner; and Robert Dickerson Jr of the Competition & Technology Law Group For Google: John Schmidtlein and Stephen Fuzesi of Williams & Connolly; and David Kramer of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati Read more: Rumble hires litigator David Boies in Google antitrust lawsuit ahead of trial Google seeks to limit reach of US judge's digital ads ruling Google asks US appeals court to overturn app store verdict
