Jeff Bezos asks his girlfriend’s brother to pay his $ 1.7 million in legal fees after defending a defamation lawsuit.
Bezos, the world’s richest person with a net worth of $ 193 billion according to Forbes, was indicted by Michael Sanchez in February 2019.
Sanchez, a Hollywood talent agent, 54, accused the 57-year-old Bezos and his security adviser, Gavin de Becker, of harming his reputation by telling reporters he leaked nude photos to The National Enquirer.
In November, Judge John P. Doyle of the Los Angeles County Superior Court dismissed the case, saying Sanchez’s allegations rely heavily on hearsay.
Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez can be seen in January 2020. Their relationship was revealed in January 2019 by The National Enquirer
Michael Sanchez, a Hollywood talent agent, was the source of the report, AMI said
Bezos said in his court documents that he never charged Sanchez with leaking the photos.
On Friday, Amazon’s founder – who rides back and forth with Elon Musk for the title of richest person in the world – asked Sanchez to pay his legal fees.
Under a California law known as the Anti-SLAPP Statute, a victorious defendant is entitled to reimbursement of his litigation costs from the plaintiff.
Bezos said in his filing on Friday that Sanchez betrayed him and his sister by selling their private messages to the tabloid for $ 200,000.
Bezos accused him of subsequently doubling down by filing a lawsuit designed to harass Bezos into a settlement “ by threatening the discovery and disclosure of private affairs. ”
Sanchez’s lawyer, Tom Warren, told Bloomberg – who first reported Friday’s filing – that the billionaire’s request was “ grotesque. ”
“Mr Bezos’s fee request is obscene, even grotesque, on many levels,” he said.
In November, Warren said Sanchez planned to appeal Judge Doyle’s ruling.
“We respectfully disagree with the court’s ruling and look forward to justifying Mr. Sanchez’s claims on appeal,” he said at the time.
It was unclear whether they still intended to appeal.
Patrick Whitesell, Lauren Sanchez and Jeff Bezos at a Hollywood party in December 2016
Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos at the Vanity Fair post-Oscars party in March 2018
The remarkable family break started in January 2019, when the tabloid magazine revealed the affair between Bezos and Lauren Sanchez, who were both still married at the time – although she was divorced from her husband, Hollywood talent agent Patrick Whitesell.
On January 9, Bezos and his then-wife MacKenzie, parents of four children, announced that they were getting a divorce after 25 years of marriage.
The next print edition of the Enquirer was only scheduled for publication a few days, and the editors, according to The Wall Street Journal, brought the Bezos story online and in print that night with a headline, ‘BEZOS’ DIVORCE! THE CHEATING PHOTOS THAT END HIS MARRIAGE. ‘
The magazine publicly printed text messages and photos of the couple, but not the nude photos.
Donald Trump, who has long been furious with Bezos over his newspaper, The Washington Post, and his company, tweeted on Jan. 13, “ I’m so sorry to hear that Jeff Bozo was brought down by a competitor whose reporting, I understand, is far more accurate than the coverage in his lobbyist newspaper, the Amazon Washington Post. ‘
Bezos asked De Becker to investigate who leaked the text messages.
The CEO of the newspaper’s parent company, AMI, David Pecker, was outraged by the investigation and sent an email to Bezos on February 5, 2019 – through De Becker’s attorney, in which he threatened to publish ten nude and otherwise personal photos unless the investigation into the source of the images was called off.
Bezos called Pecker’s bluff on Feb. 7, 2019, and fully disclosed the email, saying he refused to be blackmailed.
Sanchez firmly insisted that he had not leaked the photos and told The Washington Post on February 29, 2019 that he had not passed the photos to AMI.
“I could never give Jeff’s in a million years [naked] pix to AMI because I never had them, ‘he said.
‘If AMI has them, they come from others. Period.’
Sanchez has insisted that he did not provide the ten naked and otherwise personal photos
Lauren Sanchez and Jeff Bezos aggressively investigated The National Enquirer
However, Sanchez did not deny handing over the couples’ text messages to the magazine, telling The Post that he refused to be “ worthy ” with an “ unfounded smear ” response he provided the lyrics.
Sanchez claimed that federal investigators found he had no answer to the leaked images.
“Once the FBI and Amazon’s own investigators cleared me of ever owning the photos used to blackmail Jeff, I thought I would at least get a personal apology,” he said.
But Jeff and Lauren haven’t looked back.
‘I was thrown under the bus. Unfortunately, it is likely that the next time I see them, they will appear in court. ‘
Lauren and Michael Sanchez, raised in New Mexico, were close allies and friends
AMI issued a public statement in March 2019 saying it was Sanchez who gave them a tip about the affair and “ provided all the materials ” for the investigation.
Sanchez admitted in his lawsuit that he ‘helped’ the story in an attempt to control the story of his sister’s relationship.
In March 2020, Sanchez filed another lawsuit, this one against AMI, in which he also accused them of defaming him.
Sanchez argued that it was Saudi Arabs who hacked Bezos’s phone and leaked the photos, in retaliation for The Washington Post’s aggressive coverage of the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
AMI has dismissed the case as ridiculous.
“Mr. Sanchez’s application is his latest attempt to ignore the truth and rewrite history,” they said in a statement.
The fact, as we have consistently maintained, is that Mr. Sanchez sold the National Enquirer the story of his sister’s secret affair and was the sole source of the coverage.
“His frivolous lawsuit underscores his true motivation, his own greed.”