A former exotic dancer is suing Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, accusing him of sexual assault during a June 2009 incident in a local hotel.
The Dallas News reports:
Jana Weckerly, 27, from Ardmore, Okla., said Jones fondled her genitals, forced her to touch or rub his penis, and required her to watch as the then 66-year-old received oral sex from another woman. Weckerly is seeking more than $1 million in punitive damages.
Levi McCathern II, an attorney for Jones, said the court sealed the case late Tuesday. He released this statement:
“These allegations are completely false. The legal complaint is unsupported by facts or evidence of any kind. This is nothing more than an attempt to embarrass and extort Jerry Jones. This is a money grab by a lawyer who is a solo practitioner just trying to make a name for himself. The alleged incidents would have been more than five years old.
“We intend to vigorously contest this complaint and expect it will be shown for what it is — a shakedown. Due to the seriousness of these baseless allegations, we have also involved law enforcement.”
Jones has said the photos “misrepresented” what happened that night, but would not answer questions about the incident.
Weckerly was not available for comment Tuesday. Her Dallas attorney Thomas Bowers said his client has been in counseling and is taking medicine to help her cope with trauma from the incident.
The encounter between Jones and three women was first detailed in a rambling manifesto by a Wichita, Kan., man, Frank Hoover, last month. He included three photos of the Cowboys owner and two women in sexually seductive poses. Weckerly did not appear in any of the photos. She took them with her cellphone.
Hoover, who claims to be the son of God, said Jones later paid Weckerly and others several hundred thousand dollars to keep quiet. Bowers denied his client was involved in any attempt to extort money from the Cowboys owner.
“If anybody did something wrong, it was the Cowboys and Jerry Jones,” Bowers said. “Sometimes powerful people think they can get by with anything.”
The lawsuit also alleges that Jones conspired to cover up the incident by coercing Weckerly to sign an agreement to keep quiet about what happened that night.
Bowers said Tuesday that the sexual assault occurred in a hotel room of a local five-star hotel. Afterward, Jones and the women went to a dance floor, where the Cowboys owner allegedly continued his advances.
“After apparently too much resistance from Weckerly, Jones did what perhaps billionaires do,” Bowers wrote in a news release. “He had his large personal security men lift Weckerly and the two other women from the ground and pack them out of the club.”
Bowers said Jones started out as a friendly guy with a desire to party, at one point offering to put his Super Bowl ring on Weckerly’s finger. The attorney also said Jones posed with a kneeling woman after she spent “special time” with him. His shirt was out and his pants were unzipped.
A representative for the NFL said the league had no comment on the lawsuit, which came one day after a video surfaced of Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice assaulting his wife in an elevator. The team terminated Rice and Commissioner Roger Goodell banned him from the league.
“It’s amazing how athletes are held to a different standard than the owners, who are allowed to do things an athlete would probably lose his job for,” said Bowers. “So, it’ll be very curious to see what the league does with this.”
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(Photo Source: AP)
