Shannon Sharpe
Shannon Sharpe

Yikes…

Three-time Super Bowl winning tight end and current ESPN personality Shannon Sharpe has been under fire lately after a lawsuit was filed in Nevada over the weekend accusing him of s3xual assault. The plaintiff, who is identified only as “Jane Doe” in the lawsuit, claims that Sharpe s3xually assaulted her while they were in a relationship together, and is seeking $50 million in damages. And all of this comes on the heels of rumors surrounding a potential $100 million contract coming Sharpe’s way.

In the lawsuit, the woman alleges that Sharpe gradually became more aggressive during their time together:

“Sharpe flew into fits of anger when Plaintiff noted his infidelity to their relationship, or called him out about his extraneous activities. What had once been manipulation, control and intimidation now became something far more dangerous and sinister. Sharpe even figured out how to get into Doe’s apartment complex without her permission.”

She also claimed that Sharpe not only raped her, but had also threatened to kill her.

Sharpe also released a statement on the lawsuit, which identified “Jane Doe” as Gabriella Zuniga, and combated the claims of s3xual assault with text messages that were allegedly sent from Zuniga:

“The lawsuit, filed by Gabriella Zuniga and orchestrated by her attorney Tony Buzbee, is a blatant and cynical attempt to shake down Mr. Sharpe for millions of dollars. It is filled with lies, distortions, and misrepresentations, and it will not succeed.

In her effort to extract a large financial settlement, Ms. Zuniga presented Mr. Sharpe with a secretly recorded video of a consensual s3xual encounter. We believe the video has been heavily edited and taken entirely out of context, crafted to falsely portray a consensual act as non-consensual…

To set the record straight, we are releasing several of Ms. Zuniga’s own explicit text messages to Mr. Sharpe that clearly indicate the nature of their relationship was consensual and s3xual in nature – and in many cases, initiated by her with specific and graphic requests.”

The woman responded to that statement yesterday by releasing an alleged phone call that she and Sharpe shared at some point during their relationship. It sounds as though Shannon Sharpe was not aware that he was being recorded, and it’s possible that Zuniga was attempting to provoke some harsh words from the media personality.

If that is what was happening, it worked. The woman accusing Sharpe kept using the word “manipulate,” which evidently got under the skin of Sharpe. He responded with a threat in a clip that was obtained by TMZ:

“Oh Lord have mercy. If you say that word one more time, I will f**king choke the sh*t out of you when I see you.”

And today, more excerpts of their conversations were released, with Sharpe threatening to “choke” his accuser in public.

In the clip, the woman says that she doesn’t really want to go anywhere, but that she’s “not really interested in getting choked,” so she agrees to go out with him, to which Sharpe responds:

“I may choke you in public. Big black guy chokes small white woman.”

The accuser responds that that’s “not a good look,” and Sharpe shoots back that “it’s not a good look what you did to me.”

Sharpe hasn’t responded to the new audio clip, though he did previously call the lawsuit a “shakedown” and call on his accuser and her attorney to release all the evidence and not just bits and pieces to make him look bad:

“To my family, friends, supporters and colleagues, I want to speak to you directly and from the heart. This is a shakedown. I’m gonna be open, transparent, and defend myself because this isn’t right. This is all being orchestrated by Tony Buzbee. Tony Buzbee targets black men, and I believe he’s going to release a 30 second clip of a s3x tape that tries to make me look guilty and play into every stereotype you could possibly imagine.

That video should be 10 minutes or so, Hey Tony, instead of releasing your edit, put the whole video out. I don’t have it or I would myself. You know what happened and you’re trying to manipulate the media. That encounter in question took place during the day at her invitation, and now that appears to be a setup.”

Looks like this one’s going to get nasty, and that the parties are perfectly happy to battle it out in the public eye.