Tony buzbee filing lawsuit against Deshaun Watson? Hints at mistreating women

It's gamesmanship and lawyering. Buzbee is trying to put pressure on Watson to settle before the season starts. Hardin doesn't want Buzbee getting free press time to drag his client through the mud, needs to counter.


These are serious allegations, though. Kind of like McCarthyism all over again, in a way.

 

Anyone following this provide a quick summary recap?

Is Watson guilty? I don't think he's gonna play with us regardless.

 

We'll see what Hardin says. Should be interesting. I don't think Buzbee would lie about the FBI being involved

 

I don’t think he would either, but……that doesn’t mean much. Could just be minor questioning because it crossed state lines.

 

Yes, he would. Buzbee continues to diminish the seriousness of this situation by sensationalizing everything every step of the way. He continues to ignore the fact that court cases are heard in court and not through media dissemination of puffery. If any of those women, when this is resolved feel, that justice was not served it will be due to the words and actions of Tony Buzbee

 

If its not true, its not true... just say that and move on.

Them countering with a press conference and making a bigger deal of it than it should be (and drawing all the extra attention once again to the case) doesn't seem to be a productive strategy.

 

“Deshaun Watson did nothing illegal or improper.”
“Nothing is different today than 4 months ago.”

 

Hardin:

When goes a month without coverage, he(Buzbee) almost wilts. Until y’all give him some coverage,…he wants to leverage his civil lawsuits. He knows they have no future. He wants to promote himself and the lawsuits.

Take another vacation. Take another honeymoon. It’s not good for your clients.

(Has Deshaun talked to the NFL?) NFL has gotten a bad rap publicly. They may reach a conclusion down the line we disagree with but here’s where: they’re doing their own investigation, not consulted about. No, he has not talked to them. They don’t reach out until criminal investigation is over. They don’t want to interfere with criminal investigation. They’ve apparently talked to some women. No contact with the NFL. Right now, not aware of what they’re doing than what we read in the media and that’s how it should be. In due time, we’ll be interfacing with the NFL but not yet.

 

Yikes, he looks like a televangelist...

 

Makes sense, the BS he's trying to sell is even less believable than your typical televangelist

 

Its ****ed up, I rooted for Rusty when he represented Calvin and Roger, and I think what he's trying to do for the family of Tyler Skaggs is a noble effort but this whole situation just sucks.

 

Hardin:

Would prefer not to be doing this because usually FBI investigations are kept confidential.

Nothing new happening in this case for 4 months.

In April, FBI came to us and told us they were investigating a matter as to whether one of Mr. Buzbee’s client committed extortion in the way they were demanding money from Deshaun or what they would do if he didn’t pay them. We talked to them. We did not contact them. They contacted us. We talked to them and even let them interview Deshaun. If y’all can find a lawyer where they let their client talk to the FBI if the lawyer thought his client did anything wrong or had any exposure, I’d be very, very surprised. So we kept that confidential. They of course would not be informing us of the investigation and where it stood. I don’t know where it stands today. They have no obligation to be telling us that and we haven’t asked them. If we had relevant information and they asked, we’d share it and that was it.

It never occurred to us no matter how it might have been to our advantage to tell the public the FBI was investigating one of Mr. Buzbee’s client’s claims. Never occurred to us to go public with that. That would interfere with the FBI’s investigation and wouldn’t be appropriate.

Until yesterday, I didn’t know that they were also apparently investigating Mr. Buzbee’s allegations. I’m glad to hear they are. I wasn’t aware of it but we wouldn’t be aware of it. They wouldn’t tell us and shouldn’t. They’re conducting a private investigation. I’m delighted they are because we want everything to come out.

And this thing of sexual trafficking, that’s nothing new. Mr. Buzbee talked about it in one of his petitions he filed and made the allegation. If the FBI is going to investigate whether one of Mr. Buzbee’s client is trying to extort money, they’re certainly want to tell the public later, if there is an outcome of charges of something, that they looked at both sides. I welcome the investigation to look into all of it. We will continue to cooperate. We have cooperated with HPD, DA office and will cooperate with the FBI and down the line, the NFL. We know Deshaun has done absolutely nothing wrong.

The reason I say I didn’t want to be here is because these kind of things should not be worked out in public. They should be privately conducted so innocent people are not harmed. I do want to make sure everyone understands: if Mr. Buzbee continues to put clients out, presenting them to Sports Illustrated —who by the way if you want to talk about agendas, the SI reporter who keeps writing about this, one time in an email to me referred to Deshaun’s as yet unproven innocence which reflects an attitude—but regardless of that, if he keeps putting these people out there and having people say different things that we know we have documents for are untrue, we’re gonna be forced to respond. We’ve tried as hard as we could to not be trying this in the public domain. That is not exactly the way it’s supposed to be done.

I do want to serve notice that if people lie to the FBI, that’s a felony. I urge you, if they contact you, to tell ‘em the truth, whatever that is. We don’t want to get in the way of anybody expressing themselves about it.

The whole reason there’s never been any settlement discussions is we’ve insisted from the beginning that everything be public except private investigations. I can only conclude that Mr. Buzbee’s knowledge of the criminal justice system and the way it works, if you put it in a thimble, there’d be a lot of room left. What he’s done here is harmed his clients and harms investigations that need to be confidential but when he goes public like this, he better be sure his clients are telling the truth.

Let me give you an example. I have here, if you remember, the whole tone of these issues changed in March. First there was a lawsuit by Ms. Solis. Then there was another lawsuit and a third lawsuit for the first time alleged some type of force. Very, very descriptive language and how mortified she was and how upset she way. The woman’s name is Sheneé Lawson. Sheneé Lawson is not a woman who has made a criminal complaint but certainly sued. If you look at her petition, it’s very graphic as to how horrible this experience was and how she was harmed. She is the woman being looked at by federal authorities in how she went about this.

If you look at that petition, I’m gonna read to you text messages she sent Deshaun Watson the very day after the massage that she says so traumatized her and talked to people about.

The massage was that morning.

“Hey Deshaun, just wanted to say thank you for trusting me with your massage today. I’ll be here until January 3rd if you’d like to get another one.”

I’d urge you to go look at that petition and if see if that text/email is consistent with her petition.

And then, I don’t have a date on it because it’s gonna be after that one, probably the same day, could be the next day. She writes, “I hope all is well. I just want to say I apologize for my actions. That was not me. If I could take back that moment I would. I really devalued my integrity and my profession. My sessions have never went like that. I feel really horrible as a person.”

This is the woman later in a lawsuit alleges he forced her to have oral sex and then she was very descriptive about how horrible the experience was. Then she writes him, “Hey Deshaun, I know you’re probably busy but can you scan me the executed copy of the original NDA you have via email? Also, I wanted to ask you to know if you’re interested in a follow-up call to make sure we’re on the same page about a game plan moving forward.” That’s just one of the 22. It’s the first that alleged force. It’s demonstratively untrue. Mr. Buzbee is not doing her or anyone else any favors to start going public about FBI investigations. The initial FBI investigation was of this woman. We don’t talk about these things because they’re not fair to people.

I do want to serve notice to everyone: if you continue to make comments publicly instead of working with law enforcement as you should, then we’re always gonna respond and the truth is not gonna be your friend. I hope that everyone will back up and relax now and realize orderly investigations are going on.

HPD, we’ve given them information. I’m sure Mr. Buzbee’s people have and they’re diligently investigating. I’ve met once with the DA office, just with the women who is in charge and she is the chief of the Human Trafficking division. That doesn’t mean they are contending there is Human Trafficking going on. That’s who she is. Mr. Buzbee has made that allegation. I’m sure the FBI will look into it. We’ll continue to cooperate with her. She’s assured me they will be fair and open minded to both sides and will treat both sides respectfully. I take her at her word. The police have said the same thing. The FBI has said the same thing. I take them all at their word. They need to be left to look at these things in a very confidential and careful professional way. Going out and talking about this stuff does no one any good.

I remain absolutely irrevocably convinced Deshaun Watson did nothing illegal or improper. I’m confident those investigations will show that but I believe we should leave law enforcement to their professional duties rather than constantly having these press conferences. I didn’t want to be here but I will not let this stuff go unchallenged.

Sometimes I feel like Rodney King ‘Can’t we all get along?’ My version would be not ‘Can we all get along’ but ‘Can we just all calm down?’ There’s nothing new about this.

Some of y’all, not y’all but some people got excited about subpoenas going out. That is standard. We’ve known from the beginning and the prosecutor told us from the beginning that when their investigation is over, their findings will be presented to a grand jury. We’ll be given the opportunity to tell our side and get an even handed hearing. The FBI interviews and conducts investigations -thousands- on an annual basis and ultimately charges are a very small number. The fact someone is investigating something means nothing more than making sure there wasn’t a crime. I urge everyone to take a deep breath. Let it run it’s course. Nothing is different today than 4 months ago except they’re learning a lot more.