A University of Minnesota law professor who was falsely accused of rape won his defamation lawsuit against his accuser.
Francesco Parisi won his defamation lawsuit against his estranged lover, Morgan Wright, nearly three years after she falsely accused him of rape. The court ordered Wright to pay Parisi $1,189,514 for actual losses, economic losses, general and emotional damages, reputational damages, and punitive damages.
Parisi called the incidents that led to the defamation case a “horror movie.” The professor was accused of rape by Wright days after he won a lawsuit to evict her from one of his properties in 2016. Wright claimed that Parisi had raped her 18 months earlier in 2015. She painted a horrific picture of a violent rape that left her with three broken teeth, a prolapsed rectum, and a damaged colon.
Authorities placed him under arrest and held him in jail for three weeks, during which Parisi’s mother fell ill and died. He was unable to leave the jail to be at her bedside.
Authorities found that there was no medical evidence to support Wright’s claims of a violent assault and dropped all charges, which allowed for Parisi’s release. Despite the charges being dropped and the lack of evidence, Parisi was haunted by the accusations. The first photograph of him on Google was his mugshot, and enrollment in his courses dropped 60% — with many classes being cut altogether.
“Even after those charges were dropped, people Google my name and only see a professor accused of so many crimes,” Parisi said.
“I used to be the popular guy at parties,” he said. “I’m Italian. I bring the good wine. I don’t get so many invitations now.”
His attorney called Wright’s accusations “an attempt by an estranged friend in her ongoing attempt to extort concessions in some real estate negotiations between the parties.”
Judge Daniel Moreno agreed. He ruled that Wright’s “accusations were false, made with malice.” He added, “[She] injured Parisi as a direct result of her untruthful narrative crusade.”
In addition to the rape allegations, the court detailed several other lies Wright had told, including claims that she was a doctor, had a degree from Juilliard, and that she was the daughter of former U.N. Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold.
