Samantha Tavel, better known as Candy Cartwright, has filed a multi-million dollar lawsuit against Matt Riddle, Gabe Sapolsky, EVOLVE, and WWE.
On January 8th, Sapolsky officially responded to the lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, according to court documents obtained by PWinsider.com.
Tavel alleges that Riddle began sexually assaulting her in April 2017 in a parking lot following an EVOLVE event and Riddle bragged about it to Sapolsky. She stated that she had dates with the company and EVOLVE booked. She alleges Riddle forced her to perform sexual acts or she would lose the bookings if she didn’t. Riddle told the promotions that he didn’t want her working with them and she was told “issues with talent” was the reason why she was not booked. Now, she wants $10 million against each of the defendants.
Sapolsky filed a motion to get the lawsuit dismissed and cited different reasons as to why.
The first reason being is argued that the court should dismiss the complaint about the court lacks jurisdiction over Sapolsky because he does not live in Illinois nor own any property in the state.
The second reason is being argued that “As an initial matter, it is important to point out that Mr. Sapolsky did not hire Ms. Tavel to perform at this event. She came to the event on her volition, insisted on attending the event, and paid her own expenses.”
There are attached pieces of evidence featuring private messages between Sapolsky and Tavel from Twitter DMs. The motion also states that Sapolsky did not hire Tavel to perform at an event and that she was not an employee for EVOLVE. The motion notes that EVOLVE has only ever had two employees, Sapolsky and Sal Hamaoui.
Another reason to dismiss is due to Tavel’s lawsuit failed to state a “cognizable claim” under the Illinois Gender Violence Act. There was a statement attached by him regarding this motion to dismiss including him not being in Illinois in 2017, which is the weekend Tavel had accused Riddle of attacking her, as well as Tavel and Riddle not traveling in the pre-arranged EVOLVE transportation van, and he never asked for her to work for EVOLVE that weekend after the alleged assault.
Now, Tavel has until January 25th to file a response to Sapolsky’s motion to dismiss.
