Law&Crime Sidebar - Ricky Martin Hit with Sexual Assault Allegation After Filing Extortion Suit Against Nephew

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Starting point is 00:00:35 will 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. Singer Ricky Martin is facing new sexual assault allegations after he sued his nephew who made claims against him earlier in the summer. Martin had already filed this lawsuit against his nephew. And the Associated Press reports that this new complaint of sexual misconduct actually comes from the nephew that Ricky Martin is suing. So joining me to talk about this is Jonathan Handel. He is an entertainment lawyer out in Los Angeles. Jonathan, welcome back to Sidebar. It's a pleasure to be with you. Jonathan, what is your feeling and your thought

Starting point is 00:01:23 on this whole thing? This is turning into quite the soap opera. So we have Ricky Mark. Martin, who appeared to almost be exonerated of this in the court when his nephew dropped the claims earlier in the summer. Now we have Ricky Martin filing a lawsuit and then the nephew coming back and saying, well, I'm filing my complaint again, according to the Associated Press. So tell me your feelings on this. Well, it sort of makes your head whirl around as much as the hurricane that Fiona that recently struck Puerto Rico. And in fact, these lawsuits and claims were filed last week just ahead of the arrival of the hurricane that has shut down the island completely with 30 inches of rain and the electric power out across the island and so forth.

Starting point is 00:02:06 So we, you know, one thing to know is we shouldn't expect any progress in the next little while on this litigation. It's all been filed in Puerto Rico. But, you know, it is absolutely head-whirling. You get the nephew filing these, making these allegations, then withdrawing them. And according to the filings from Ricky Martin's lawyer, the nephew admitted under oath that he had never been sexually molested by Ricky Martin. Now we have, as you said, new claims being filed. The claims were the complaint did not have the name of the accuser, but the AP is reporting, and we don't know what the sourcing is, that, in fact, it is the nephew again. This is, you know, if that's the case, you know, one can withdraw lawsuits either. quote-unquote, with prejudice or without prejudice. And with prejudice would mean that you can't

Starting point is 00:02:59 refile without prejudice means that you can. But if he indeed admitted under oath that he was never sexually molested, it really is just looks to become an abuse of the legal process. And I would expect that Ricky Martin's lawyers would argue that. They are suing, we should say, for a total of at least $30 million, $10 million in direct damages. In other words, contracts and gigs that Ricky Martin alleges that he lost and $20 million for reputational injury to Ricky Martin, who of course is world famous. I'm kind of wondering to myself when you throw those numbers out here, where on earth does Ricky Martin think his nephew? Well, the nephew's making the allegations, but what I mean is he's suing his nephew for this amount of money.

Starting point is 00:03:46 Where on earth is Ricky Martin's nephew going to get this kind of money? I'm a little bit stunned. I can't imagine he has that kind of money to throw around. So from just a PR standpoint, if you're Ricky Martin, why file this? Because unless his nephew is independently wealthy, how is he ever going to get any of this money if the suit goes forward and he wins? Well, the nephew doesn't seem to be independently wealthy. According to the complaint that Ricky Martin's lawyers filed, the nephew is living with his parents. So he may, it doesn't sound like he's independently wealthy to the tune, certainly not to the tune of $30 million. But I think that the reason to file a lawsuit like this is twofold. One is to create a forum where Ricky Martin can defend himself and put to rest, assuming these allegations are not true, finally put them to rest. In other words, receive a judicial decision or endorsement or settlement from the nephew or something where the nephew admits definitively that the allegations run true, if in fact they're untrue, and be done with it. Because otherwise, what you've got is a criminal, you know, criminal complaint that the nephew filed or a, not a criminal complaint, but a protective order complaint that the nephew filed and then withdrew, and that just hangs out there. And there's no further, you know, adjudication. So that's one reason. The other reason is that as part of the, you know, part of a settlement or a judgment, I, well, it certainly is part of a settlement, I imagine, Ricky Martin's lawyers would seek to get the nephew to agree to never contact his uncle again.

Starting point is 00:05:18 you know, to stay away. The allegation by Ricky Martin is that there's been a pattern and practice of harassment over social media over WhatsApp and Instagram, I think, you know, and boasting, this is my uncle and, you know, and then private messages, you know, DMs to Ricky Martin and, you know, even, you know, I want to, you know, putting up a Facebook or a social media profile page for one of Ricky Martin's children and posting Ricky Martin's cell phone number allegedly, just, you know, and wanting to take the kids out to a movie and just sort of on and on that, you know, again, I should caution. We haven't heard directly or even through the news media from the nephew. And, you know, so, right, so once again, I mean, as a theme that I think

Starting point is 00:06:08 that we've pointed out on multiple occasions, you have the sort of court of public opinion and the court of, you know, the court of law. But what Ricky Martin is trying to do here is bring this into a court of law and get this settled definitively, I think. I just don't understand how the nephew, if he under oath in court, said he didn't molest me, how he then is sued by Ricky Martin and then says, oh, wait, I'm going to claim it again now because you sued me. I mean, that's kind of what it looks like. If it is indeed the AP's reporting is accurate, that it is the nephew who filed this complain again. I just don't understand how what his game is or what he's trying to do other than trying to get Ricky Martin to drop the lawsuit, which seems like that's not going

Starting point is 00:06:52 to happen. Yeah, that's clearly not going to happen. And again, assuming that Ricky Martin's lawyer is straightforward in their presentation, namely their claim that he, that the nephew admitted under oath that there was no molestation, you know, the questions you have to ask are not only what's going on inside this nephew's head, which, you know, perhaps is a, perhaps Ricky Martin is quite right that this is a disturbed person. But you also have to ask, you know, what's going, the nephew is not filing his own legal papers. He's represented by counsel. And so you have to ask also, you know, where are the guardrails that counsel should be providing? And if this is being done, you know, without basis,

Starting point is 00:07:42 counsel, you know, I don't know Puerto Rican, you know, state law, you know, territorial law, but certainly in most jurisdictions in the U.S., there are provisions for attorneys to be sanctioned if there isn't some at least reasonable basis, colorable basis for the litigation. I mean, we see that in a lot of the cases against the Trump lawyers now, you know, that their statements without basis have come back to bite them. And, you know, that could well be the case here with the lawyer as well if indeed what we're seeing reported is accurate. And we should mention that Ricky Martin has released a statement to media outlets, including deadline. And he says that these claims are wildly offensive and

Starting point is 00:08:27 completely untethered from reality when this man's previously similar allegations were made. His legal case had to be withdrawn. So Ricky Martin is not backing down. Jonathan Handel, thanks so much for joining us. As always, we appreciate your time and your insight as always. Thank you. And that's it for this edition of Law and Crime's Sidebar Podcast. It is produced by Michael Dininger and Sam Goldberg. Logan Harris is our editor.

Starting point is 00:08:53 Bobby Zoki is our YouTube manager. Alyssa Fisher handles our bookings and Kiera Bronson does our social media. You can get Sidebar downloaded on Apple, Spotify, Google, and wherever else you get your podcasts. You can also watch it on Law and Crimes YouTube channel. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy, and we will see you next time. You can binge all episodes of this law and crime series ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

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Law&Crime Sidebar - Ricky Martin Hit with Sexual Assault Allegation After Filing Extortion Suit Against Nephew

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