Justin Baldoni's team seemingly tried to pressure Blake Lively into dropping emotional distress claims [Updated]

The notion that Lively might drop her claims of intentional infliction of emotional distress and negligent infliction of emotional distress only became public knowledge through a Baldoni court filing, per Deadline. The filing was pretty obviously meant to make Lively look bad and to bully her into withdrawing her claims with prejudice, meaning the claims couldn’t be re-filed. Apparently, Baldoni’s side wants Lively to provide her medical records (Variety reports this is standard in emotional distress complaints), but Lively’s team suggested she might drop those complaints instead, though if she does so without prejudice she could still revisit those claims down the line. Monday’s filing from Baldoni and his Wayfarer Studios partners sought for the judge to force Lively to either hand over her medical records or drop the claims with prejudice. 

Lively’s team quickly identified this as another attempt to litigate in the press. “Once again this is a routine part of the litigation process that is being used as a press stunt,” her attorneys said in a statement (via Deadline). “We are doing what trial lawyers do: preparing our case for trial by streamlining and focusing it; they are doing what they do: desperately seeking another tired round of tabloid coverage. The Baldoni-Wayfarer strategy of filing retaliatory claims has exposed them to expansive new damages claims under California law, rendering certain of Ms. Lively’s original claims no longer necessary. Ms. Lively continues to allege emotional distress, as part of numerous other claims in her lawsuit, such as sexual harassment and retaliation, and massive additional compensatory damages on all of her claims.”

In other words, Blake Lively stands by her story regardless of the specific legal claims that end up actually being litigated. But Baldoni’s team already succeeded in undermining that story. By publicizing that she was considering withdrawal before she ever actually withdrew anything, they made her look like a liar with something to hide. Though both legal teams were warned to cease attempts at public smear campaigns, Baldoni’s team clearly has a few more dirty tricks under their sleeves. 

UPDATE: On Tuesday, Judge Lewis Liman denied Baldoni’s attempt to compel Lively to hand over her medical information on the basis that she’s planning to withdraw her emotional distress claims, per Variety. With that in mind, he also stated that “the Court will preclude Lively from offering any evidence of emotional distress” in this particular trial (reminder, there are lawsuits flying all over the place, and this is just one of them). The question of whether Lively will withdraw with prejudice (meaning she can’t ever re-file these particular emotional distress claims) or without prejudice (meaning this claim could come back up in court again someday) is still up in the air. Lively hasn’t yet amended her suit, nor has she amended any of her claims regarding sexual harassment, retaliation, and a hostile workplace on the set of It Ends With Us.