Law&Crime Sidebar - Shannon Sharpe $50 Million Rape Lawsuit Heats Up with X-Rated Texts

Episode Date: April 23, 2025

Former NFL superstar turned commentator and podcaster Shannon Sharpe is facing allegations of rape and sexual assault from a Jane Doe, who is suing him for $50 million. Sharpe’s legal team released alleged text messages from Jane Doe to Sharpe, saying the alleged victim’s own words show their sexual contact was consensual. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber discusses the texts and newly leaked audio with litigator and criminal defense attorney Mauricio Padilla.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW:Download the FREE Upside App at https://upside.app.link/sidebar to get an extra 25 cents back for every gallon on your first tank of gas.HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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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. To my family, friends, supporters, and colleagues, I want to speak to you directly and from the heart. This is a shakedown. We have a new public response, a new disturbing piece of audio and new graphic text messages. The legal battle between NFL Hall of Famer Shannon Sharp and his sexual assault accuser definitely has intensified. As we go through these new developments, who's telling the truth about what really happened? Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. A new legal war has begun, and this time

It's between NFL Hall of Famer, podcaster, commentator, Shannon Sharp, and the woman who's accusing him of sexually assaulting and raping her as recently as January of this year. Now, we covered this earlier in the week, but now not only has Shannon Sharp fired back in a major way releasing a public message, a response, apparently revealing the identity of this Jane Doe, but he's also published never before seen apparent text messages between the two. Quite a response, to say the least. And then what happens? You think the story ends there?

No, she fires back by releasing an apparent audio tape between her and Shannon Sharp. This is crossed to a whole different kind of level, and I want to get into what we're seeing right now. We're going to break it down. But first, let's take a step back. Let's learn a little bit more about the backstory. What's happening here? So we have 56-year-old Shannon Sharp who has been sued by an unidentified woman. She's going by the pseudonym Jane Doe, and she is suing him.

for $50 million in Nevada court. She claims that after meeting Shannon Sharp at the gym back in 2023 and beginning a consensual relationship with him, who by the way, she claims is 30 years older than her, it escalated into him allegedly insisting they record their sexual activity, sometimes without her knowledge, him sharing those videos with others, him allegedly telling her that he would do things to her that, quote, would make no other man want her, that he allegedly manipulated her, controlled her, threatened her, intimidated her, was able to gain access to her apartment complex without her permission. For example, this is from the lawsuit. It reads,

The verbal abuse never stopped. He would berate and degrade plaintiff just as he had from the beginning. One time specifically, he was yelling at her while there was a firearm visible in his room. Terrified for her safety, plaintiff tried sharing her location with friends from her iPhone just in case. But Sharp saw her doing this. The moment he realized what she was doing, he grabbed her by the neck and told her, if you ever do that again, I will bleeping kill you. And then this finally all allegedly culminated with Jane Doe claiming that in October of 24, sharp, violently, sexually assaulted and raped her in Las Vegas all while she was allegedly sobbing. And she claims he did this again recently in January of 2025, her allegedly begging him to stop as this

was purportedly going on. So she has sued him for assault, sexual battery, battery, sexual battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress. She's being represented by Texas attorney Tony Busby, who we know famously represented a Jane Doe in a now defunct sexual assault lawsuit against Jay-Z. He represents several accusers and actions against Sean Diddy Combs as well. But as I mentioned, Shannon Sharp has responded. This is what we want to get into. And let me tell you, did he respond? A lot of money at stake in this case, right? And talking money, Actually, how about getting money back? Let me tell you about Upside.

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So first, we have this statement from him on his Instagram where he says that he's going to be open, transparent, defend himself because this isn't right. And he says that this whole thing is being orchestrated by Tony Busby. Tony Busby targets black men, and I believe he's going to release a 30-second clip of a sex tape that tries to make me look guilty and play into every stereotype you could possibly imagine. That video should actually be 10 minutes or so. Hey, Tony, instead of releasing your edit, put the whole video out. I don't have it or I wouldn't myself.

You know what happened and you're trying to manipulate the media. And he goes on to say that the encounter in question took place during the day at the invitation of Jane Doe, says that this was all a deliberate setup by her. He also, by the way, revealed her first name and apparently her name that she purportedly, uses on only fans. We're not going to reveal those names here. We're not going to do that. But he does go on to say, quote, my career is all about real talk and honesty. I know my family and fans know exactly what this is about and I'm going to be out there telling you whatever I need to say just like I always do. And we also got a statement from his attorney, Lonnie J. Davis.

And that reads, Mr. Sharp categorically denies all allegations of coercion or misconduct, especially the gross lie of rape and will not submit to what he's. he sees as an egregious attempt at blackmail. He stands firmly by the truth and is prepared to fight these false claims vigorously in court. And Davis has also commented about that apparent tape that was seemingly referenced by Sharp because he accuses Jane Doe of providing a, quote, secretly recorded and heavily edited video to them that purports to be a non-consensual encounter of some kind. But Davis claimed that Jane Doe, quote, has refused to provide a copy of the full unedited version of the recording to Mr. Sharp's legal

team. And then there's this. Sharp and his legal team released all of these apparent text messages between him and this Jane Doe, reportedly 44 pages worth of communications. For example, as reported by TMZ, there's one apparent message from October 2023 where Jane Doe seemingly messages Sharp, I won't you to put a dog collar around my neck and choke me with it while you're bleeping me. Now, the New York Post reporting on other messages allegedly from Jane Doe, like Tie me up and do bad things to me. I know you miss this big, juicy bleep, 25K for each cheek. Tie me up like this and bleep me with sharp replying.

If I knew how to, I would. She then allegedly wrote back, it's okay. I have handcuffs. We can stick to those for now. Jane Doe also allegedly writing. I want like some hardcore BDSM action though and feeling kind of freaky lately. Then you have this apparent message from March 14th, 2024. I want to be abused, Daddy.

And then another message from last year where she apparently wrote him, I've always wanted a black baby. Now, Lonnie Davis commented that, quote, the evidence paints a clear picture. This was a consensual adult relationship that included role-playing, sexual language, and fantasy scenarios. So what happens then? Again, this is not the end of the story.

Jane Doe ends up releasing an audio tape seemingly between her and Sharp. And I'm going to explain part of what is heard on this tape. We can't play it for legal reasons. But here is part of the exchange, and this part is key. Again, this is from the audio tape. Jane Doe says, don't manipulate me. Sharp replies, if you say that word one more time, I'm going to choke the bleep out of you next time I see you.

Jane Doe pauses, takes a minute, and says, well, I don't want to be choked. And Sharp replies, yes, you do. I don't think you have a choice in the matter. Now, to be clear, this tape may only be a portion of the entire conversation. and audio, but this appears to be a portion nonetheless. Jane Doe's attorney, again, Tony Busby described this audio as, quote, the contents of this clip are certainly not sexual. They are not playful.

They are instead disturbing, aggressive, and dangerous. This audio paints a very clear picture of how Sharp treated Jane Doe, leading her to escape from him by leaving Nevada and blocking all contact with him. And he added that they released this audio in response to Sharp's lawyer, Lonnie Davis, trying to discredit Jane Doe by releasing all of these alleged texts, which, by the way, Busby says, are basically irrelevant because they're all before the alleged assault. Okay, so now I want to bring on Mauricio Padilla, litigator, criminal defense attorney to talk more about this.

Maricio, thanks so much for taking the time. Let's just start with the lawsuit and the allegation, suing for $50 million. Very graphic details about these multiple alleged sexual assaults and rapes. Your take just on the initial lawsuit and allegations? I mean, my take on the initial lawsuit and allegations and the publicity that's come right after it. I mean, there's rules of ethics to prohibit people from trying their case in the media. And I think from the onset, both sides are engaging in releasing what could be evidence. And the rules of ethics from state to state vary, but they pretty much usually are concentrated on not releasing any information that could possibly

affect a jury and they're out there releasing pages and pages of tax messages. They're out there releasing audio. It looks to me like both sides are engaged in trying to litigate this in the media before litigating it in a court of law. But isn't that the Justin Baldoni Blake lively effect, right? Isn't that what we're seeing now? It's the idea of let's battle this out on the port of public opinion, particularly by the way, when you're dealing with such a public figure like Shannon Sharp, the idea of if I'm fighting this on a court of law, but I'm also fighting this in the court of public opinion, if I can put enough out there to try to reverse the narrative, maybe not only I'll still retain my fan base, my career, but also it puts pressure on Jane

Doe maybe to stop the lawsuit or maybe not because she fired back too. No, I'm not saying that that, you know, they shouldn't do it because unfortunately we live in a time where if you don't do that on behalf of your client, are you doing them a disservice? I'm just mentioning the fact that none of this is really allowed pursuant to the rules of ethics, but I understand why they're doing it because nowadays, pretty much the court of public opinion is dictating what happens in court in and of itself. So it's just part of litigating cases nowadays. Are you concerned by the content, the value of those text message conversations? Does it complicate this case? Let me rephrase. Putting aside, assuming these really are the real conversations

and the real messages of Jane Doe. You could say, I mean, she's talking about BDSM, tying up, dog collars, choking, and then she accuses him of sexual assault and being violent with her. Let me actually read you something from the lawsuit. Okay, so this is from the lawsuit. It says, a woman can say yes to consensual sexual relations with a man 99 times. But when she says no, even once, that no means no. Defendant Shannon Sharp, a man who is accustomed to getting what he wants, completely fails to understand this basic concept.

After many months of manipulating, controlling plaintiff, a woman more than 30 years younger than he, and repeatedly threatening to brutally choke and violently slap her, Sharp refused to accept the answer no and raped plaintiff despite her sobbing and repeated screams of no. So you look at those messages, are they irrelevant? If you establish a pattern of, you know, S&M, a pattern of voluntarily submitting yourself to someone to accepting, you know, violence, accepting as part of the norm of your sex life, then obviously that's something that can be used because he's going to say, yeah, it was consensual. So when a jury's trying to analyze whether or not these acts of violence were consensual or not, they can obviously look to the history of the relationship. and whether or not she's going to admit it. So now you put her on the stand and you're like, so you allowed him to choke you.

You allowed him to hit you previously. And that was something that you guys engaged in, voluntary sexual behavior, and you found it pleasurable. And you did it for the X amount of months. But then on this particular day, you told him no. You know, so it's something that it's, it's fruitful to bring up a trial. I think it's, I think they would be doing them a disservice if they didn't explore that more. And yeah, ultimately what, what Mr. Busby saying is true.

A woman can say yes 99 times and say no that 100 times, but the historical behavior of accepting violence as the norm in your bedroom and in your sex life is something that a jury can look at to determine whether or not she did in fact say no, because he's going to say that she said yes. He's not going to admit that she said no, that he raped her. No, no, I hear you. I hear you. And I knew that he was going to get on the defensive. I mean, if you're, if you believe his side, right, that he's going to.

completely innocent. You get hit with this lawsuit, right? You want to defend yourself immediately. He goes out, he puts out this message on Instagram. Do you think he was advised by his lawyer to do so? Let's start there. And B, purportedly outing her, naming her name, just the first name, first name, and also what her apparent handle is her name on Onlyfans. Is that appropriate? That right? I mean, again, he's defending himself, but she filed this anonymously. Right. Well, whether or not his attorney advised him to do it, if he took those steps without discussing it with his attorney, his attorney should be very upset at him doing something of that nature. I don't think that an attorney can counsel their client to disclose

the identity of a victim in a sex case. So I don't think that his attorney would ever admit to taking those steps simply because there's laws to protect victims in sex. but I understand why it's beneficial to his defense. I'm putting it out there. I'm saying who you are. I'm saying that you're an only fan person. I'm saying that we're engaged in this voluntary sexual behavior where you possibly accepted money to do sexual things on camera

or do sexual things for me. So it definitely benefits his defense in letting people know, listen, this is not the person that Busby saying that it is. This is the person that I'm telling you who she is. So I think it's beneficial. And to reverse it, I said this when I covered it earlier in the week, this lawsuit being filed by Tony Busby, he's got crosshairs on him right now. He filed a lawsuit against Jay-Z by a Jane Doe who claims that she was sexually assaulted by Jay-Z when she was 13 years old back in 2000. That lawsuit against him was dropped. The NBC did a report questioning the credibility of some of her claims. His attorneys came forward and said, no, we have proof that the people you say were there weren't there. And that lawsuit was dropped. He's now being sued. That Jane Doe is being sued. You would think. okay, if this happened, I'm going to maybe take a little step back here, but to go so public and forward with allegations against the high profile figure like Shannon Sharp, he must

not only believe the account of Jane Doe, he must believe he's got the goods to back it up. Definitely. And listen, when you're an attorney, you have wiggle room in the sense that if you have a client that's telling you what their version, you know, you have to act reasonably and you can't just believe someone that you may have knowledge that she suffers from psychiatric conditions, but you have a lot of leeway. Like you have a client that's telling you, you're allowed to believe your client and you're allowed to litigate on their behalf. And obviously, there's rules in place for a lawyer not to pipe, piper, a complete myth and sue people without a basis. But, you know, when you do have a client that's telling you, what occurred,

I think he has a lot of leeway in the way that he acts simply because he has a client that's telling him and he's he's allowed to believe that client. Now, there's limits and apparently, you know, regarding the JZ, fronted with evidence that he couldn't refute regarding the lack of liability, then he dropped the lawsuit. If he's defending his own lawsuit, that's separate from this one. So I don't see why a guy like Busby would change his, you know, his MO, so to speak, and retreat. Because at the end of the day, he's making money. He's making money. He's trying to make money. and he's got insurance to, you know, to defend him of lawsuits.

So I don't see why he would change. Now I want to move on to the audio tape, this audio tape that was apparently released by Jane Doe's side. Now, again, this might only be a portion of the conversation, but it is a portion of this conversation. And it's important. You'll have Tony Busby saying this is nothing fun about this. There's nothing sexual about this. This is disturbing. This is him threatening to choke her and saying she's not going to have a choice.

Whereas I imagine you're going to hear. Shannon Sharp say there's more to context to the conversation, look at what our relationship was like, but this was another move in this chess game, releasing this audio tape. What's your take on it? Well, listen, an audio tape like that is damning just because if you're, you know, if you're a man and you're and you're talking like that to a woman, even if your defense is you have to look at the totality of the circumstances, you have to look at the relationship that we had where she was voluntarily submissive to me. And then I was, you know, in a position where we would obtain sexual pleasure from me being a dominant figure. That has to be his defense. But a lot of people would reject that right off the bat. Like, that's something that a lot of people are not going to stomach, are not going to understand. And he definitely has his work cut out in trying to explain to the viewing public why that type of language to a woman is appropriate.

It has to be his defense has to be that you're only looking at a small piece. But if you look at the entire, you know, entire relationship, that's how we would do it. And that's because she was submissive to me. People are going to reject that. Now, I will tell you this. As this came out, I said to myself, how did they release those messages so quickly? They must have had it ready, right? You can't just have those messages.

And I said to myself, did they know this was coming? Well, what do I come to find out? According to NBC, Lonnie Davis, again representing Shannon Sharp, has confirmed that Sharp apparently made a fan. financial offer to this Jane Doe to try to settle this case before she filed it. In fact, while it seems he first said that it was tens of millions of dollars, then clarified and said it was at least $10 million. So the idea that if that's true, they tried to get to settle it and then she files and now they have their messages ready, what does that tell you?

Listen, I think that that's part of what Busby has been doing historically. like they approach you and they tell you listen we have this let me know if you want to resolve this previously i think if anybody looks at like the p ditty didn't do it right and then they filed against him and he settled the case in a day we see the value of resolving cases so i think it's on par with how busby has been litigating his prior cases to give them an opportunity if when you look at it yeah settlement negotiations are usually privileged if someone hears that he offered 10 million dollars what is a normal person going to think he's guilty of something because people don't just even if you're rich don't

don't go out there throwing around tens million or millions of dollars to resolve cases when they're innocent people are going to people are going to associate that offer of settlement which they probably shouldn't but they will they're going to associate that offer of settlement with guilt at the time of this recording i haven't seen shannon sharp file a countersuit of any kind but talk to me if this works could he counter sue for defamation or is there a litigation privilege right you're allowed to make claims against somebody you're shielded away from every time anybody sues anybody the other side will say it's not true you can't just turn around say it's defamation right

I mean he could he sue for defamation right well you're right there is a litigation privilege regarding defamation actions so I always tell people this when people ask me can they sue people can sue all the time whether or not it's going to survive a motion to dismiss honestly I've seen it in my career over 22 years, people sue for things that are ultimately going to get dismissed, and it doesn't affect their willingness to do it, their desire to do it, but you're right. There is a litigation privilege because I guess the mindset, the universal mindset, is that you don't want to be gagging people in a court of law. You want people to have the freedom to express themselves openly without the threat of litigation while they're in litigation, and that's the entire. So to answer your question, it seems like you're right. A litigation privilege does apply. but nowadays people get sued for all kinds of things.

And I wouldn't be surprised if we see a countersuit because, again, his perspective is, this is blackmail. These are false allegations. And by the way, what's the timing of it? And by the way, when we talk about Shannon Sharp, he's a powerhouse in the podcast space, host club Shay Shay, Nightcap, tons of followers. According to front office sports, he's expected right now to sign a new contract worth more than $100 million.

Do you think that comes into play at all? problem with, with, you know, people that have those types of contracts is it doesn't have to mean that you're guilty or not guilty. Just the news in and of itself is going to affect your ability to, you know, get followers, to do your job and to execute contracts. Now, if he loses a $100 million contract because of this, whether there's a litigation privilege or not, you can expect the lawsuit. Even if the standard for a motion to dismiss is, you know, lower than the standard for a motion for summary judgment. You could file a lawsuit. You could survive motion to dismiss. And routinely, judges don't like to decide cases on summary judgment. And they often say

that almost anything is an issue of fact for the jury because they know they're not going to get appealed when they make that type of ruling. And they like to kick it to a jury, even if it is the type of case that shouldn't survive motion for summary judgment. So what I'm saying is that even if you have a clear defense, even if they don't have a good, good case, a law is still something that can be fruitful to either side. Do you think this is going to end up settling or is it now just too far down? How do you settle it without one side looking bad? The problem is when you're dealing with someone like him, that his livelihood depends on the way that people view him,

on whether or not people reject him or not, whether or not people are going to tune in or not, once we're at this point where me and you are discussing it publicly, you know, and it's out in the media, then how do you really repair his reputation? We look at like Johnny Deft, how Johnny Deft had to spend millions of dollars to sue Amber Heard. And at the end of the day, the entire lawsuit was just for him to get back whatever reputation he had. So it wouldn't affect his ability to make money in the future. So in my opinion, I think that the genie's out of the bottle and resolving it at this point, isn't going to do anything for his reputation and his career.

But you never know. Yeah, I'm sure. And look, there could be a lot more to this as this case ultimately progressed. Maricio Padilla, thanks so much for taking the time. Good to see you. Thank you, sir. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us.

And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you should get your podcasts. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.