Portuguese soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo was reimbursed more than $300,000 for legal fees he incurred while defending himself in a federal civil case that alleged he raped a woman in a Las Vegas hotel room in 2009, CNN reports. U.S. District Judge Jennifer Dorsey dismissed the case in June after finding that the plaintiff’s lawyer had engaged in misconduct so severe that Ronaldo could not receive a fair trial. The judge ordered the attorney representing accuser Kathryn Mayorga, Leslie Stovall, to pay Ronaldo $334,637.50, concluding that Stovall had harmed the footballer through “bad‑faith lawyering.”
Ronaldo’s legal team had sought a larger amount, but Dorsey determined that Ronaldo and his lawyers had prolonged the case longer than necessary. The dismissal was with prejudice, meaning Mayorga cannot refile the complaint. Mayorga claimed she was coerced into signing a non‑disclosure agreement and a $375,000 settlement after the alleged rape, which Ronaldo has maintained was a consensual sexual encounter. She later asked a judge to void that agreement. The settlement’s existence was first reported by the German newspaper *Der Spiegel* in 2017, based on leaked confidential communications from Ronaldo’s attorneys.
Last year, a court found that Stovall had contacted the source of the leak to obtain those documents, which included “the reporting and communications of the attorneys and investigators representing and defending Ronaldo following the sexual assault through the negotiations and conclusion of the settlement and non‑disclosure agreement.” Judge Dorsey wrote that “Stovall’s repeated use of stolen, privileged documents to prosecute this case has every indicia of bad‑faith conduct.” She noted that the misappropriated documents and their confidential contents were woven into the very fabric of Mayorga’s claims, and that merely striking the leaked documents and disqualifying Stovall would not sufficiently address the misconduct.
The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department reopened a criminal investigation at Mayorga’s request in August 2018. In July 2019, the Clark County District Attorney’s Office announced it would not pursue criminal charges, stating that the allegations could not be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
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