Paula Abdul Settles “Hard-Fought Battle” With ‘American Idol’ EP Nigel Lythgoe Over Sexual Assault Suit
(Updated with Nigel Lythgoe statement) Almost a year after Paula Abdul hit American Idol EP and So You Think You Can Dance judge Nigel Lythgoe with a sexual assault and gender violence lawsuit, the former collaborators have settled.
“I am grateful that this chapter has successfully come to a close and is now something I can now put behind me,” Grammy winner and veteran TV judge Abdul told Deadline Friday in a statement via her Johnson & Johnson legal team of the December 9 dated agreement.
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“This has been a long and hard-fought personal battle,” Abdul went on say of the multiple assault claims against the much accused Lythgoe. “I hope my experience can serve to inspire other women, facing similar struggles, to overcome their own challenges with dignity and respect, so that they too can turn the page and begin a new chapter of their lives.”
First indicated in dismissal notices filed last month, not long after Abdul filed an amended complaint in October with details of a third attack by Lythgoe and more, the December 12 notice of settlement pretty much closes up the whole case.
Though Abdul reached a deal with co-defendants FremantleMedia North America and American Idols Productions back in April, the matter with Lythgoe was scheduled to go to trial in August of next year. A hearing next month in LA Superior Court on previous motions could now be the official unconditional end of this four-claim complaint, if it isn’t taken off the docket beforehand.
The settlement is confidential, but I hear both parties feel it was “a fair conclusion,” according to an individual with knowledge of the agreement.
In what proved the opening of several similar sexual assault suits against the once high-flying Lythgoe, Abdul on December 29, 2023 accused the producer and production companies of sexual assault/battery, sexual harassment, gender violence; and negligence.
Detailing two attacks, one in the early 2000s and one at Lythgoe’s LA home in 2015, at the time Abdul lamented that Lythgoe was fully aware of conducting “inappropriate and even criminal” behavior towards the much mocked Abdul — to the point he even made a jokes about it. “Indeed at one point Lythgoe called Abdul and taunted her that they should celebrate because it had been ‘seven years and the statute of limitations had run,’” the 16-page late 2023 filing stated. “Lythgoe clearly knew that his assaults of Abdul were not just wrong but that he held the power to keep her silent.”
Abdul was able to file a civil complaint against Lythgoe, who has insisted on his innocence and attacked Abdul’s mental and emotional capacities, which she did under the December 31, 2023 expiring Sexual Abuse and Cover-Up Accountability Act.
“We live in a troubling time where a person is now automatically assumed to be guilty until proven innocent, a process that can take years,” Lythgoe said today. “That is why, like Paula, I am glad to be able to put this behind me. I know the truth and that gives me great comfort.”
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