Key takeaways:
- Katz and the ballet dancer refused a physical relationship; accusers now state they erred on her age.
- Allegations that the Edmonton Oilers owner paid ballet dancer Sage Humphries for a physical relationship in 2016 have been dropped from a U.S. civil suit.
Allegations that Edmonton Oilers landlord Daryl Katz had a physical relationship with an underage ballerina have been dropped from a U.S. civil case.
The voluntary discharge motion about the allegations against Katz was filed in U.S. District Court in Nevada the prior week. A simultaneous motion to strike removes all connections to the dancer, Sage Humphries, being “underage,” “a minor,” or “17 years old,” as was once alleged when she met and exchanged texts with the billionaire in the spring of 2016. Connections to “statutory rape” and “sex trafficking” have also been attacked by third-party lawsuits.
Both Katz and Humphries have rejected that they ever had a physical relationship.
The withdrawn allegations were made by Mitchell Taylor Button, a dance teacher, and his spouse, Dusty Button, earlier a principal member of the Boston Ballet, as part of the couple’s defense against a sexual abuse case undertaken by seven aspiring ballerinas in 2021.
Read more: Almost 9 million Canadians have uncashed cheques from the CRA — worth $1.4B
Their third-party lawsuit, filed in July, expressed a consensual “throuple physical relationship” with Humphries, the lead plaintiff in the abuse case, while alleging that she had been concerned in three previous physical relationships as an underage teen with much older males, including Katz.
It also argued that Katz had paid the young dancer $75,000 for “her physical favors.”
The filing had screenshots of text messages allegedly exchanged between Humphries and Katz, discussing amounts of $25,000 and $50,000.
In the motion to strike, Marc Randazza, the attorney for the Buttons, states that “it is highly uncommon for a party to move to strike portions of its pleadings,” but says that data provided to them now “calls into question” their previous assertions regarding how old Humphries was when she had transactions with Katz.
Source – CBC News
