Is Jimmie Allen trying to delay facing justice in a sexual assault lawsuit filed against the country singer?
That’s what his accuser claims after Allen’s attorneys asked to withdraw from the case late last year.
The lawsuit was filed back in May in the federal court in Tennessee by a woman, identified only as Jane Doe, who used to be a member of Allen’s management team at Wide Open Music. The woman claims that, while she was managing Allen, he repeatedly raped her and subjected her to sexual assault for a period of 18 months.
Allen has denied the claims, and even countersued his accuser, as well as a separate accuser in another lawsuit who also claims she was sexually assaulted by the singer.
And while he said in a statement that he intends “to mount a vigorous defense” to the allegations, his attorneys asked the court to withdraw from the case, claiming that Allen is “unable to comply with the terms of his engagement.”
The lawyers, Jonathan Cole and Katelyn Dwyer from Nashville law firm Baker Donelson, claim that their ethical obligations require them to leave the case since Allen is “unable” to meet the terms of their agreement to represent them.
But the attorney representing the alleged victim says that she’s already dealt with three sets of attorneys for Allen over the past year, and that his habit of hiring new legal teams is just his way of getting out of having to turn over evidence to his accuser.
The attorney for the accuser, Elizabeth Fegan, wrote in a response to the court:
“Allen has a track record of moving through attorneys. These tactics are part of Allen’s continuing pattern of conduct to forestall Plaintiff’s right to gather discovery to pursue her claims.”
She also claims that Allen’s current legal team has already collected information relevant to the case, but that they don’t plan on turning that over before withdrawing from the case.
For his part, Allen’s public relations manager Dria Baum denies that the embattled singer is trying to stall, telling The Tennessean that he simply “decided it was best for his case to bring in new legal counsel at the top of the year.”
It’s just the latest in a series of drama surrounding Allen, after it was announced last year that he and his wife Alexis were getting a divorce, before revealing last summer that the couple were trying to “work through things as a family.”
Either way, it’s going to be a while before Allen’s alleged victims get their day in court, with his former manager’s case against him not scheduled to go to trial until November 2024.
