Ryan Kavanaugh allegedly files $50M countersuit over sex harass memo
Ryan Kavanaugh would appear to be in a hole — yet the former head of twice-bankrupt Relativity Media keeps digging.
The ex-mogul — who early last week was accused by an arbitration judge of falsifying a harassment memo that potentially torpedoed the career of Adam Fields, Relativity co-president — has tried to strike back.
In a $50 million countersuit against the same co-president, Kavanaugh contends he didn’t falsify the memo that charged Fields of sexually harassing seven unnamed women.
The suit — riddled with typos and allegedly filed in Los Angeles’ Superior Court of California on Thursday — claims instead that the memo in question was “opened by Kavanaugh whom (sic) read it and did resave it causing it to show last modified.”
Whether the suit was even filed could not be confirmed.
A copy contained by The Post had no case number, and lawyers for Fields said on Friday they couldn’t comment on the case because they hadn’t been served.
Kavanaugh’s assertion in the “suit” counters the conclusion of Judge Terry Friedman, who after an arbitration hearing awarded Fields a total of $8.45 million for breach of his employment contract when Relativity fired him in 2016.
“The [forensic] metadata refuted all of Relativity’s theories linking the memorandum to [another executive at the studio] and establishes that it was last modified on Oct. 15, 2017 by ‘kav kav’ which must be Kavanaugh,” Friedman concluded.
Because the studio went into bankruptcy in July 2015 and returned to Chapter 11 in May 2018, Fields included arbitration materials in a “proof of claim” submitted to bankruptcy court to establish himself as a studio creditor.
But Kavanaugh’s suit claims the “proof of claim” information should have remained under wraps in arbitration, calling its public appearance “directly violative of the confidentiality provision of the arbitration clauses.”
Rules promulgated by the arbitration provider indicate otherwise.
Another point of confusion is the complaint’s boast that “Kavanaugh prevailed on every count [in arbitration].”
Yet two paragraphs later the suit admits “Fields’ sole count of success was a breach of contract against Relativity” — which, as a legal eagle noted, is a good win to have in a breach of contract suit.
Kavanaugh could not be reached, and his lawyer did not respond to requests for comment.