Tony Buzbee represented several of the women involved in the Deshaun Watson sexual assault saga, and he’s now the lead counsel for the two flight attendants who have accused now-Commanders kicker Brandon McManus of sexual assault during a Jaguars plane trip to London last season.
Buzbee got the case from another lawyer, and he explained to the Junkies how it came to be on Thursday’s show, but would not reveal too much info.
“As you probably know, we’d be very careful about going beyond what's in our public filing, but we tried to put as much detail in there as possible. This is not my primary line of business, filing sexual assault cases, but when I do agree to take one on, you know, half the people hate me and the other half hate the clients, and no matter what the athlete does they’re never gonna believe he did anything wrong. That’s fine, that's why fans are fanatics, right?” Buzbee said. “In this particular instance, I was not very familiar with transatlantic flights and the way the athletes are transported, but what I came to learn was that you just are simply not supposed to have alcohol on those flights, and athletes actually bring their own alcohol on the flight. In one of the allegations in this case, according to my clients and other witnesses, Mr. McManus brought his own alcohol, and the flight attendants who did participate in the revelry, I believe it was two, ultimately were terminated. The ones that didn't, my clients who alleged that they were assaulted, were, on the flight back, put on the upper deck of the plane away from Mr. McManus and others. So there's a lot more to this than people know, and all that will play itself out in the court process in Florida.”
The case was filed on a Friday to try to avoid a huge PR disaster for all involved, and the accusers are listed under pseudonyms for the same reason, but it was picked up and has gotten play in the media outside of DC.
“The Deshaun Watson case had a lot to it, but this case is just a simple situation where one individual is alleged to have drank too much and got out of hand, and I think we saw a newspaper article yesterday or the day before where some anonymous player who was on the plane said he was very uncomfortable with it and the team was angry at McManus for the conduct,” Buzbee said. “Apparently, some of the players including the individual sued here, made attempts to get the flight attendants to participate in whatever they were up to, and a couple of them did. I know people have strong beliefs about these kinds of cases because I've had these cases before, but this is just two women trying to do their jobs who should not have had to deal with that kind of foolishness, and apparently the NFL has cracked down on that kind of thing in the past. My two clients who did not participate, and who were very upset about what had happened, they were taken off of Jacksonville flights. To my clients’ point of view, that wasn't probably the fair way to handle things, but it is what it is, and so now we have a court case and we'll pursue it that way.”
And according to Buzbee, this has escalated to a court case because of McManus and his representatives.
“Your listeners will probably be surprised at how many times throughout the year these kinds of things come across my desk, and typically the way these things are handled is, you send a letter and try to sit down together and talk and see if we can resolve it, because it's not good for me, the client, or the person accused,” Buzbee said. “Every single day across the country, these kinds of things are resolved, and that's what we attempted to do in Deshaun Watson and in hundreds of other cases. But, in this case, we were met with aggression and arrogance, and even if everything you say is true, that's not actionable. That’s the same kind of response we got with Deshaun Watson when we laid out exactly what we believe had happened and what we believed the evidence would be. So now here we are, we filed a case in the late hours of a Friday night, under pseudonyms, and I'm talking on the radio show generally about the case.
EB is skeptical about everything in the world these days, and even Buzbee admitted he often is, too, but ‘you can only imagine the kind of things that come across my desk.’
“I have to be very particular about which cases I take and vet the cases and make sure there are witnesses, and look at the person in the eye and see if I believe them, and whether they're a legit person,” Buzbee said. “There are witnesses here and it was documented when it occurred. A lot of people make a lot of baseless claims – and it’s really hard when somebody accuses you to prove a negative – but when you're making a claim like that, you are opening yourself up to the most viciousness of abuse, so I’m very real with these people and tell them how it is.”
So why is this a civil suit and not a criminal complaint?
“I can't comment as far as criminal charges. Understand this happened when it happened, and they came to me many months later and they went to other lawyers first,” Buzbee said. “Those are tough cases. We saw that in the Deshaun Watson matter. They're working with a whole different dynamic, and burden of proof system, so I really don't know why that happened and won't comment on it. But what I will say is that I've always been very critical of the NFL, but within a day, I got a call from the main investigator for the NFL, and she wants to talk to these women, so we'll see how that process plays out.
But it’s not really about the money, believe it or not; I know people may say come on, but the truth is, when somebody's done something to you like that that's a violation, you want some sort of accountability and somebody to take responsibility for that, and I think that's really what this is. To put themselves through something like this, it's got to be more than just about money, because they have a job and a good living.”
Listen to Buzbee’s entire call above!
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