Law&Crime Sidebar - Kanye West Plans to Sue Celebrity Dentist Over Apparent Nitrous Oxide Addiction

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Starting point is 00:00:35 keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Rapper and record producer Kanye West alleges in a bombshell legal letter that his dentist got him hooked on nitrous oxide laughing gas and he plans to sue for all the damage this seemingly caused him. It is a wild new set of allegations and we will analyze all the claims and ask, if true, does this explain the recent controversial moments from the music artist? Welcome to Sidebar. Presented by Law and Prime. I'm Jesse Weber. Have you ever gone to the dentist and they give you nitrous oxide laughing gas? You know, I had my wisdom tooth taken out last year. They gave it to me,

Starting point is 00:01:23 honestly. Not the worst thing when you're getting a tooth removed, but it's pretty simple, straightforward, right? What happens if you sue over it? Yeah, you claim that it was excessive, it was damaging, you became addicted, and, oh, by the way, you claim it was all done to get your money. Now, if you're saying yes to those questions, are you Kanye West? I wonder if you are, because that's exactly what he's planning to sue over right now. In a notice of intent to sue letter that we got our hands on and that was seemingly

Starting point is 00:01:50 drafted by Wes' lawyer and sent to the rapper's celebrity dentist, maybe former dentist, Dr. Thomas Connolly, West and his wife, Bianca Sensori, are indicating that they plan to file a lawsuit against him for a whole array of claims. In fact, in an accompanying press release from West Company Yeezy, it reads, Yee and his wife, Bianca, serve Beverly Hills dentist, Dr. Thomas Connolly noticed today. They are suing him for medical malpractice, gross negligence, fraud, exploitation, abandonment, psychological and emotional trauma, reckless administration of controlled and uncontrolled substances and other malicious and deceitful behavior. So you might be saying, what is going on here?

Starting point is 00:02:30 Are these legitimate claims? Well, let's talk about it. So first and foremost, it's our understanding that under California law, a health care provider has to be provided 90 days notice of a future legal action in order for there to be a viable lawsuit. But more importantly, this legal notice, this letter, was seemingly drafted by a friend of mine, friend of law and crime used to be on a bunch, Andrew Charkaski, of Golden Law. Actually, message with him last night.

Starting point is 00:02:54 He confirmed with me. He is representing Kanye West. This is an authentic letter, according to Andrew. And it reads, quote, your conduct fell egregiously below the applicable standard of care and violated both your legal duties and professional obligations causing substantial harm to our clients. So the letter begins by explaining how Kanye West became a patient of Dr. Connolly's in 2024.

Starting point is 00:03:17 Apparently, the doctor performed all kinds of dental work form, including the insertion of this custom titanium crown. Page 6 reporting that it's worth $850,000. Now, the allegation is that from 2024 through 2025, Dr. Connolly engaged in a pattern of improper conduct. Like what? Quote, you repeatedly administered or supplied nitrous oxide laughing gas and or other sedative substances to yay in quantities and frequencies that had no legitimate dental or medical justification, including, quote, for recreational use. The accusation. The accusation here is that the doctor even supplied large quote surgical size nitrous oxide tanks to west home with masks and taught west how to self-administer this with no supervision and there's

Starting point is 00:04:06 also the claim that dr connolly was told to stop doing this but refused it's unclear who told dr connolly to stop but that's what this notice of intent seems to state and connolly allegedly even knew the apparent detrimental effects the gas was having on conier west but letter alleges that as a result of this nitrous oxide use, West began to show signs of neurological issues, erratic behavior, confusion, memory lapses, incoherence, unpredictable changes in mood, impaired motor function, other cognitive and behavioral impairments, but yet Connolly is accused of continuing to supply it or not doing anything to stop it. And how do you prove this, right? Well, how do you prove it? Well, the letter alleges that, quote, on multiple occasions,

Starting point is 00:04:47 Dr. Connolly acknowledged in writing that his treatment of West was improper. and that he apologized in text and emails to West and Sensori for making mistakes in treatment decisions. And in terms of an alleged motive, the letter claims that Dr. Connolly charged $50,000 a month for continuing to supply the gas under the guise of legitimate dental treatment or anesthesia. Namely, the accusation is that he was engaging in exploitation for profit. Actually, in the accompanying press release, it alleges in spring 2024, Connolly attempted to seize control of global music and fashion brand Yeezy LLC, while its principal, Yay, was incapacitated with a cocktail of controlled and uncontrolled substances. Moreover, Dr. Connolly is accused of improperly

Starting point is 00:05:32 administering the sedative, the anesthetic, propofal, took Kanye West outside of a medical setting, including allegedly at a hotel in Las Vegas. Hey, everybody, this is a law and crime legal alert. Did you know that children are being diagnosed with serious conditions like type 2 diabetes and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, and the research is potentially linking ultra-processed foods to all this? Yeah. Well, Morgan and Morgan is stepping in to fight to hold these food companies accountable. With decades of experience fighting large corporations, they are ready to stand up for the families who deserve justice. So if you're a child diagnosed type 2 diabetes or fatty liver disease, then visit www.4thepeople.com slash food or scan the QR code on screen

Starting point is 00:06:13 to learn more. The letter continues after subjecting yay to the affirmation. you subsequently withdrew from his care abruptly and without proper notice of transition. You failed to ensure that Yeh received any follow-up medical care, detoxification, or referral to specialists to address the nitrous oxide dependency and neurological damage that you negligently, recklessly, or knowingly caused you abandon your patient at a time when he was in dire need of care, this abandonment violated your professional ethical obligations to your patient. And it is alleged that West suffered neurological and physical injury, psychological emotional harm, chemical dependency, financial harm, economic loss, loss of consortium, meaning

Starting point is 00:06:50 Sensori lost the companionship, the support, the services of her husband during this time. And towards the very end of the letter, there is a demand that Dr. Connolly provide copies of West's dental and medical records, preserve all evidence, including communications, billing records, contracts. Okay, a lot to get into here. So let me bring in right now, criminal defense attorney Michael Gottlieb, to talk more about this. Michael, thanks so much for coming here on sidebar. Wow, quite the allegations in this letter. Let me just first start off. What are your general thoughts at reading this? So my first reaction was, you know, yeah, Kanye has definitely lost his mind. Kanye has, you know, I think the world kind of knows that. And then I was,

Starting point is 00:07:37 you know, I sort of scratched my head and said, you know, a lot of that was before 2024, because these allegations are in 2024. I recall that in 2022, Adidas dropped Kanye. So, you know, I think any time a civil lawyer looks at a case like this, you look for liability and damages. Okay. So while you may have admissions from, you know, Dr. Connolly, who is a well-known, well-respect, respected boutique dentist, is known to charge these kinds of monies because he's got a star clientele. Maybe he made some admissions that his standard of care wasn't perfect. But at the same point in time, I don't know that he can be blamed for the mental decline of Kanye West, which is something that we've seen in the public for at least 10 years. Well, to be clear,

Starting point is 00:08:26 they haven't made that direct connection, right? Michael, they haven't said, oh, because of the nitrous oxide, that's why he went on alleged anti-Semitic rants, right? And I agree with you. The first thing I thought was, this is so interesting. Is this explaining a lot of the erratic behavior? that we've been seeing. And what do I mean by that? I mean, one of the things, for starters, he purchases this Super Bowl ad, Kanye, where he said,

Starting point is 00:08:49 I spent, like, all the money for the commercial on these new teeth. Once again, I had to shoot it on the iPhone. Go to Yeezy.com. And if you went to Yeezy.com at the time, it featured a T-shirt with a swastika, and we know that he's been accused of making a series of controversial antisemitic comments.

Starting point is 00:09:05 But I guess maybe explains a little bit of the behavior at that time. I'm not sure. Maybe because he could be suffering the detriments of it that we just didn't see. Absolutely. So, you know, I read the demand letter, and the demand letter seemingly talks about the loss of business relationships. I mean, look, you can sue for loss of consortium. You're not going to get deep money.

Starting point is 00:09:26 So if you're looking for a significant amount of money, or maybe he doesn't really care about money, Kanye has money, maybe he's looking to make this lawsuit to cover his most recent erratic behavior. and then have sort of, you know, the doctor to blame for it. And then Kanye sort of rebuilds his reputation out of this lawsuit by blaming it on the addiction to this over-the-counter medication. How, if you know this, how successful are lawsuits where you're claiming someone else got you hooked or addicted to something? Because I wonder if a jury or court would say, wait a minute, you have to take some ownership in this as well. You had to recognize that, you know, this was. your own doing as well. You voluntarily allowed the tanks to allegedly be delivered to your

Starting point is 00:10:15 home. But then again, on the other hand, you could say, I was supplied so much nitrous oxide that I became addicted. I didn't want this at first, but I had no choice. Again, there's still a lot more details that need to be fleshed out. But, you know, blaming someone for your addiction, are those claims you see a lot? So I have a sort of unique perspective on this in that I'm in recovery. And, you know, you know, I don't think I can blame, you know, the liquor companies and the beer companies for making me drink or, you know, for any other substances or anything like that. It's with you. And when you talk about somebody like Kanye, yeah, there's no doubt that there's drug pushers and they're claiming Connolly is a drug pusher. But at the same point in time, you're talking about a person who is surrounded by a team of people all day long.

Starting point is 00:11:02 These are people who are watching him, watching him put together his Super Bowl ad, giving him guidance. You know, so to say this one person in his life was, you know, supplying him with drugs and is the genesis of his addiction, I think you're going to have a hard time selling that when there's so many other people involved in Kanye's life. And again, addiction is something that, you know, while many people get involved because somebody pushes the drug on them, we learn in recovery, you know, just it's just for today. You know, don't pick up today, don't use today. You have the ability to turn that down. And this is not a significant controlled substance. It's not, it's an over-the-counter substance. It's not as addictive as cocaine or alcohol.

Starting point is 00:11:46 In California, the possession of this is a misdemeanor. First of all, Michael, thank you for sharing that. I had no idea. And congratulations on your journey. It's not easy. And I think you really articulated it quite well what the complications of this could be. You know, I can't have you on and not ask, is this a crime, right? I mean, here, one of the things you always wonder in a case like this

Starting point is 00:12:08 is, A, is this a crime if these allegations are true? B, how come I haven't seen anything at this point to suggest Kanye West went to law enforcement. So yeah, one of the first things I thought of is why didn't they go to law enforcement first? Why file a demand letter, hold a press conference unless it's some kind of squeeze play for money, which we know again that Kanye probably doesn't need or, again, he's trying to fix his reputation. In California, possession of nitrous is a misdemeanor. But I think the larger problem would be if Dr. Connolly is not allowed to practice medicine outside California, if he prescribed medications or took medications, let's say, to Las Vegas,

Starting point is 00:12:51 if he doesn't have a license to practice there, that could be either a federal crime or certainly a crime in Las Vegas, depending on the schedule of the medication. that he prescribed. So yeah, I think there's definite issues. And if I can add one other thing to that, I thought it was interesting in what I read, which is if Kanye's claiming that he was addicted, he hasn't yet been for treatment seemingly, or at least the letters and all the indicators. I just think it diminishes his claim to say, hey, you got me hooked on and addicted to this stuff in 2024. Here we are almost halfway through 2025. If the addiction is so pervasive, why hasn't he sought treatment? Well, Michael, so the only thing is I'm

Starting point is 00:13:32 pulling up the letter and it says, he asked to undergo or plans to undergo medical intervention to detoxify and recover from this dependency, the road to recovery from this induced addiction has caused and will continue to cause pain, suffering, and significant disruption to his life. I mean, that's written like a very good plaintiff's lawyer seeking damages. It's incredibly obtuse, in my opinion. Either he did engage in medical intervention or he plans to, which is it? You know, and I think if he hasn't yet, it certainly diminishes any recovery he might be seeking, as well as, you know, underscores his case in its entirety. Well, going back to the idea of could this be a crime?

Starting point is 00:14:14 Because just to put everything in context for a second. So Dr. Connolly, very well-known dentist, apparently, you go to his website, Man Smile. It says Dr. Thomas Connolly is a pioneer in luxury cosmetic dentistry crafting multimillion-dollar smiles for some of the world's most influential figures in entertainment in sports. With 25 years of expertise in locations in Soho, NYC, Beverly Hills, Dr. Connolly's precision and artistry are sought after worldwide. His extensive training includes the Mayo Clinic, University of Detroit Mercy, and Louisiana State University, and he has served as a clinical professor at Harvard University Dental School and Columbia School of Dental Medicine. And apparently he's worked closely with celebrities like Post Malone, Von Miller, featuring their custom mouthpieces on social media, huge photos on the walls of his office.

Starting point is 00:15:00 But this wasn't the first time this accusation came up because West and Sensori's representative, this described right-wing political figure, Milo Yanopoulos, I might be mispronouncing his name, I apologize, made an allegation this past summer on X, posting that Dr. Connolly was intent on, quote, diminishing Ye's mental faculties so that Connolly and his business associates could extract millions of dollars from him. He reportedly also filed an affidavit with the California Dental Board, alleging that the doctor charges rappers and cartel bosses for natural stones but puts vastly cheaper lab-grown diamonds in their mouths instead. And according to reporting from the Hollywood reporter Milo claimed that a Yeezy employee actually saw these nitrous oxide tanks being

Starting point is 00:15:45 brought to Sensori's apartment, several employees allegedly taking photos of them being installed, and now apparently Connolly claimed they were all empty and a representative for the doctor said at the time that this allegation was made that this version of events were not only factually incorrect, but also intentionally misleading. So, Michael, I mean, this is amplified what the motive would be here. And it makes me, what are we talking? I mean, they've accused him of fraud in the legal papers. But again, going to a criminal case, is it expands beyond the charges we're talking about

Starting point is 00:16:18 more than just a license? You know, from my perspective, those are just allegations. I don't know how you make the leap to, you know, you got him addicted. and then you were trying to sort of take over his empire or, you know, take money from him. I don't know what the demand letter didn't specify what evidence they have in that regard. It talked about the admissions he's made for perhaps overprescribing, delivering the tanks and, you know, the things that you just mentioned. But I don't know how you get from there to taking over, you know, his empire. You know, it seems tenuous.

Starting point is 00:16:53 But again, these are these are demand letters that are intended to, number one, the 90-day rule, you know, get your insurance in order. Let us see what you have. Let us see if it's worthwhile suing. Number two, give you the opportunity to respond and see if you want to resolve this quickly. So you're going to put the strongest, ugliest demand letter you can together. And as well, when you put this out there in the public eye, you want to give an incentive for the doctor to resolve this and resolve it quietly so that these egregious claims go away as quickly as possible. Doesn't it make it really tough for him to resolve this? because if he doesn't fight it, it's his reputation on the line.

Starting point is 00:17:30 I mean, these are serious allegations. If he were to end up settling it, resolving it, I wonder what impact that might have. Or alternatively, somebody can look at this and say, you know, Kanye West, Radic guy, these are wild allegations. I'm not going to take him as true. Although, again, this was drafted by Andrew Tchaikaski. He's a great lawyer.

Starting point is 00:17:52 I know him. So it's not like, you know, Kanye has drafted this himself. So there is something to this. Yeah, absolutely. You know, Tricasky's reputation, the kind of lawyer that he is, definitely lends credibility to a claim such as this. But you have probably one of the worst clients that you would want to have because, as I said before, his mental decline was long before this.

Starting point is 00:18:15 He's got plenty of handlers to watch what he's doing and has been doing. And I, you know, I think when you look at a claim like this, I think Connolly, who, you know, has hundreds of people who he's put veneers on, or as you said, other rappers or artists that he's put diamonds in their mouth. There's a lot of people who are going to say, this guy never engaged in any kind of conduct like that towards me, never pushed anything on me, has been nothing but professional. So I think in a case like this, you resolve it quietly, file an NDA, non-disclosure agreement, and both people move on with their lives. It'll hurt financially, but people forget 15 minutes. Let's talk about that response. So by the way, on X,

Starting point is 00:18:56 There were more posts that were shared about this intended lawsuit from Milo that I mentioned before because he wrote, I noticed Yeh's behavior changing in April and May of 2024 and attempted to intervene unsuccessfully this first time. Even with the affidavit a few months later, it has been more or less my word against Connollies until now. I feel enormous relief and joy that Connolly will at last get what is coming to him now. Yay and Bianca are as a couple holding him to account. Always do the brave and necessary thing when a friend is in danger. it's in action you can't come back from what do you expect putting aside the idea of resolving this right in an nda if he wants to file a legal response to this um dr connolly how do you

Starting point is 00:19:39 think he would challenge this what do you think he would say and by the way could he could he file for defamation because i know there's a litigation privilege you can't just file a defamation lawsuit against somebody who makes accusations against you in a civil lawsuit otherwise there be no civil lawsuits. But what could be his legal response other than trying to settle this and have an NDA signed? Yeah, I would expect a fairly aggressive initial response, you know, because somebody like him who has a public image, you want to ring that bell loud and clear. Cases like this, you know, tomorrow you'll be reporting on something else and this case won't be in the news as loud, you know, and when they resolve it six or eight months down the road,

Starting point is 00:20:22 people are going to remember the initial response that he had and and we tend not to pay so much attention to the resolution. So I would expect a very vigorous response, perhaps something claiming that these allegations are false spurious and defamatory in nature and a potential countersuit type allegation, absolutely. Would there be legitimate to doing this? Because let's say, for example, there were communications where he apologized. And let's assume there were delivery of nitrous tanks, is there any legitimate use of doing this? I mean, on the part of Dr. Connolly, what would a defense be other than saying this is totally inaccurate? Nothing like this happened. Everything's being mischaracterized. I never had

Starting point is 00:21:07 tanks delivered. Could there be a legitimate explanation, you think? I mean, other than a legitimate medical use, it's a quasi-benine party drug. You know, people fill it into balloons take hits and it gives you a euphoric effect um you know for a few minutes but i'm not sure that that's a legitimate use yeah it's just something you know you see at concerts and you know um for party purposes but you know again it's not a controlled substance nationally california like i said criminalizes it but it's not scheduled one two or three it's not considered to be that harmful it's an over-the-counter medication if you will so i i suppose one could argue for its euphoric effect. Yeah, it's got a legitimate use in the home beyond its use

Starting point is 00:21:58 in dentistry. One more thing I wanted to ask you was the preservation notice part of it, right? Preserve all records, communications. Talk to us about the importance of that. And if somebody, you know, assuming Dr. Connolly or another defendant didn't know they were about to be sued, I imagine during the course of business, things get deleted. So talk to us about the purpose of those preservation notices why they're important and what happens if somebody you know deleted information not necessarily because I knew they're about to be sued but normal course of business he probably would have wanted to get rid of whatever communications he had but let's understand that you know when you communicate on an electronic device there's always the recipient's receipt of that communication

Starting point is 00:22:42 but yeah anytime you want to file a suit like this a preservation letter is key because you want to use somebody else's words against them. That is pretty damning evidence, especially admissions. And when you're getting it from their phone, their source, it's very difficult for them to say, well, you made that up, that's fabricated, that was spoofed, or some kind of claim like that. So preservation letters are a great way of showing we're serious. We mean what we're saying. You know you have this evidence and this evidence will come out in court from your side of the case, from your mouth, and that's going to hurt you. Michael Gottlieb, I got to say, you know, we booked you for a different topic, but, you know,

Starting point is 00:23:27 this broke. It's not every day. Kanye West Seuss's former dentist for nitrous oxide addiction, and you roll with the punches. You came in. I really, really appreciate your terrific insight on this case. And let's see where it goes. Maybe it will wrap up. Maybe we will see a legal response. Maybe this will all be dropped. I don't know. It is just a wild headline and some very serious allegations here and we take them very seriously here at law and crime michael gotley thank you so much thank you take care all right everybody that's all we have for you right now here on sidebar thank you so much for joining us and as always please subscribe on youtube apple podcast spotify wherever you should get your podcast i'm jesse weber we'll speak to you next time

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Law&Crime Sidebar - Kanye West Plans to Sue Celebrity Dentist Over Apparent Nitrous Oxide Addiction

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