Jon Gruden, former head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders, is suing the NFL and commissioner Roger Goodell.
The complaint filed Thursday in Clark County District Court in Nevada seeks monetary compensation for the “malicious and orchestrated campaign” that “sought to destroy the career and reputation of Jon Gruden.”
THE ERASURE OF JOHN GRUDEN IS A HYPOCRITICAL OVERREACTION
Gruden seeks unspecified damages on seven claims, punitive awards, and payment for attorneys’ fees.
Gruden, 58, stepped down from his role as coach last month after emails from his time as an ESPN analyst a decade ago revealed homophobic, misogynistic, and racist language. The lawsuit alleges he was “forced to resign.”
“Defendants’ treatment of Gruden was a Soviet-style character assassination,” the complaint says. “There was no warning and no process. Defendants held the emails for months until they were leaked to the national media in the middle of the Raiders’ season in order to cause maximum damage to Gruden.”
The complaint alleges Gruden’s messages were singled out from among the 650,000 emails examined in an investigation into the work environment at the Washington Football Team and that the media frenzy around Gruden was orchestrated as a distraction.
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Among the emails that came to light were insults toward Goodell, who is described in the complaint as serving as “the judge, jury, and executioner due to his attempt to exercise unfettered authority over internal NFL disputes.”
“It is certainly not within Commissioner Goodell’s authority to disclose confidential information to the media or to pressure a team to fire one of its employees because that employee insulted Commissioner Goodell,” the lawsuit says.
The Washington Examiner reached out to the NFL for comment on the lawsuit.
