According to experts, Vince McMahon’s secret NDA’s may not be worth the paper they’re written on.
On January 25th, Wall Street Journal reported that former WWE employee Janel Grant had filed a new lawsuit against Vince McMahon. The lawsuit contains horrifying allegations and graphic descriptions of sexual assault, emotional abuse, and sex trafficking at the hands of McMahon and former Executive Vice President of Talent Relations John Laurinaitis.
The suit is seeking to void a previous NDA and for financial damages, which the amount is unspecified. This is the latest in allegations about McMahon that began back in 2022 when it was reported that the WWE Chairman paid $12 million in hush money to four women.
Wall Street Journal reported on February 2nd that Vince McMahon is being federally investigated as a result of the sex trafficking claims. Laurinaitis, who was fired in 2022 amidst the investigation into alleged misconduct, now claims that he was also a victim of Vince McMahon.
VICE reports that according to one source close to the situation, Vince McMahon did not inform WWE of the NDA’s before he signed them on the company’s behalf. The story references attorney Carrie Goldberg, who represented victims of Harvey Weinstein.
Goldberg noted other issues with the NDA, among them that the copy Grant filed in federal court in Connecticut wasn’t actually signed by McMahon in either his personal capacity or role as then-chair of WWE; normally, all parties would receive an executed copy of the contract.
According to a source familiar with the matter, though, the contract was in fact executed, with McMahon secretly signing on both his behalf and that of WWE after seeking counsel from his longtime attorney, Jerry McDevitt, a seeming conflict of interest Goldberg called “bizarre.”
The report notes that the secrecy of the NDA’s is why the company needed to restate its financial reports for multiple years after the payments were discovered.
Vince McMahon’s NDA’s Likely Not Enforceable
Earlier in VICE’s report, Goldberg called the NDA’s “poorly-drafted” and vague, stating:
“The NDA makes references to confidentiality, but there’s no definition of what to be confidential about. It’s very vague. Usually there’s super-specific information about what to be confidential about.”
Law Professor Jodi Short was asked to comment on the NDA’s, and issued the following statement to VICE:
“It is my considered opinion that NDAs such as the one you sent me are unenforceable under common law contract doctrine. But there is very little case law squarely on point, and litigating such a case would expose an individual to enormous cost and litigation risk. That’s why most people end up silenced by NDAs even if, technically, they’re not worth the paper they’re written on. It’s not just the paper. It’s paper backed by an extreme asymmetry in resources between the two parties.”