A federal judge has rejected a constitutional challenge from WWE, TKO Group Holdings, Vince McMahon and Linda McMahon in the “Ring Boys” lawsuit, allowing the case to keep moving forward.
U.S. District Judge James K. Bredar of the District of Maryland on Monday denied the defendants’ motion for judgment on the pleadings in a 26-page memorandum opinion, finding that Maryland’s Child Victims Act of 2023 does not violate the U.S. Constitution as applied to them. The law eliminated time limits for filing civil lawsuits over childhood sexual abuse.
The plaintiffs, eight men identified as John Does, allege they were sexually abused as minors in the 1980s and 1990s while working in connection with WWE events. They allege that ring announcer and ring crew chief Melvin Phillips Jr. recruited underage boys and used his position to groom and abuse them, and that Vince and Linda McMahon knew about the abuse and failed to stop it. Phillips died in 2012. The defendants have denied the central claims in the lawsuit.
The defendants argued that having to defend against decades-old claims violated their due process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment, noting that key witnesses have died, including the three alleged abusers. Bredar acknowledged those deaths in his opinion but noted that “at least some others who allegedly have knowledge of the abuse are still living.”
He wrote that the defendants “do not grapple at all with rational basis review” and did not “show how their particular hardships make the CVA arbitrary or irrational.”
Bredar also rejected the argument that the law violates the Constitution’s Ex Post Facto Clause by being punitive. “Its primary aim is not to punish the perpetrators of sexual abuse, but rather to allow the survivors to bring childhood claims that were lost through no fault of their own, and often due to the actions of their abusers,” he wrote, concluding that the act “is a civil remedy to which the Ex Post Facto Clause does not apply.”
The judge did recognize the challenge facing the defense. “The Court is acutely aware that the revival of decades-old allegations poses difficult evidentiary issues for both parties,” Bredar wrote. “And it may be hard for Defendants to muster an effective defense where evidence is stale, memories are frail, and witnesses are deceased. But the Court’s role here is to interpret the United States Constitution and to resolve disputes that arise under it.”
“This ruling is a significant victory for our clients and for other survivors of childhood sexual abuse who have waited years for the opportunity to seek justice,” said Greg Gutzler, the DiCello Levitt partner leading the litigation, in a press release. “Trauma does not follow a legal deadline, and Maryland’s Child Victims Act recognizes that reality.”
The Maryland Supreme Court upheld the Child Victims Act under the state constitution in 2025. Bredar largely denied the defendants’ motions to dismiss in December 2025 and allowed the plaintiffs to keep using “John Doe” pseudonyms in May. Monday’s ruling does not decide whether the alleged abuse happened or whether the defendants are responsible.
According to a letter from Bredar’s chambers filed on the docket, a telephone conference with counsel is set for November 17 at 10 a.m. to establish the schedule for the rest of the case.
Linda McMahon is the U.S. Secretary of Education. The case is John Doe 1 et al. v. World Wrestling Entertainment, LLC et al., Case No. 1:24-cv-03487, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland.
