Ailes Accuser’s Sex-Abuse Lawsuit Against Fox News Can Proceed, NY Judge Rules
A judge ruled that Luhn’s claim to have signed an NDA under duress may be valid.
Aaron P. Bernstein/Reuters
Fox News will have to face yet another sexual-misconduct lawsuit, a New York State Supreme Court judge ruled on Monday. Judge Lyle Frank ruled that former Fox News booking executive Laura “Laurie” Luhn’s lawsuit against the network, its parent company, and executive Bill Shine, alleging they enabled years of sexual abuse by late founding CEO Roger Ailes, can proceed in court. Luhn’s claim that she signed a confidentiality agreement as part of a settlement with the network under duress may be valid, the court ruled. “The complaint alleges that the defendants controlled the plaintiff’s life. Thus, there is at this point, some question as to whether this control led to the plaintiff’s signing of the subject agreement,” Frank wrote. “Only through discovery can it be shown as to whether the duress that plaintiff suffered through her alleged years of abuse impacted her entering into the subject agreement.” Luhn told The Daily Beast in 2021 that Fox News lawyers were “terrorizing” her to keep quiet about the decades of alleged sexual abuse she suffered under Ailes.
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