A lawsuit against Lady Gaga was dismissed by a California judge. While the Plaintiff will have the opportunity to re-file her lawsuit, the court’s ruling will likely prevent the Plaintiff from raising a colorable cause of action.
The lawsuit stems from an incident on February 24, 2021 when Ryan Fischer was walking three of Lady Gaga’s dogs in Los Angeles. On that night, he was attacked by multiple men who stole two of the dogs. He was shot in the chest and hospitalized. While Fischer lost part of a lung, he fortunately survived his injuries.
James Howard Jackson was identified as the main culprit, pled no contest to a count of attempted murder, and was sentenced to 21 years in prison. He was one of five people who participated in the violent robbery and its aftermath. It is believed that the group’s motive was the value of the French bulldogs, which can be up to tens of thousands of dollars.
After the attack and theft, Lady Gaga announced that she would pay a $500,000 reward for the return of her dogs, Koji and Gustav. Jennifer McBride returned the dogs to Lady Gaga. After returning the dogs two days after the theft, McBride was charged with receiving stolen property and being an accessory to the crime. McBride eventually pled no contest to one count of receiving stolen property and was sentenced to two years of probation.
Not surprisingly, Lady Gaga did not pay the reward and McBride subsequently sued Lady Gaga.
The Judge has held that allowing McBride to pursue the claims “would allow her to benefit from her admitted wrongdoing.” McBride now has 20 days to resubmit the case, but any attempt to do so will likely be futile.
The result of this case makes total sense. Obviously, one should not be able to commit a crime and then profit from that crime.
