A former assistant to Vin Diesel, certainly one of Hollywood’s most bankable motion stars, filed a sexual battery lawsuit towards the actor on Thursday, saying that he groped her and pinned her towards the wall of an Atlanta resort room through the filming of the fifth “Fast & Furious” film in 2010.
Within the lawsuit, the previous assistant, Asta Jonasson, mentioned the encounter came about lower than two weeks after she was employed to work for Mr. Diesel. The actor grabbed her, groped her breasts and forcibly kissed her whereas she repeatedly mentioned no, in response to the lawsuit. Mr. Diesel pulled her gown up and moved to tug down her underwear, the lawsuit mentioned, earlier than Ms. Jonasson screamed and ran towards the toilet.
The criticism mentioned Mr. Diesel then “pinned her against the wall with his body, and grabbed Ms. Jonasson’s hand and placed it on his erect penis.” When she once more refused to interact, the lawsuit says, Mr. Diesel started masturbating whereas preserving her pinned to the wall.
A lawyer for Mr. Diesel, Bryan J. Freedman, mentioned in a press release that Mr. Diesel “categorically denies this claim in its entirety.”
“This is the first he has ever heard about this more than 13-year-old claim made by a purportedly nine-day employee,” Mr. Freedman mentioned. “There is clear evidence which completely refutes these outlandish allegations.”
Mr. Diesel, 56, rose to fame after Steven Spielberg forged him as a soldier in “Saving Private Ryan”; he established himself as a number one man primed for brawny roles along with his performances as a killer within the “Chronicles of Riddick” sequence and a member of the Navy SEALs within the comedy “The Pacifier.” In 2010, he was filming one other starring function within the “Fast & Furious” franchise, which he revisited this previous 12 months in “Fast X.”
Hours after the encounter within the resort room, in response to the lawsuit, Ms. Jonasson acquired a name from an government on the manufacturing firm — Mr. Diesel’s sister, Samantha Vincent — and was informed that it not wanted “any extra help.” Ms. Vincent and the manufacturing firm, each of which couldn’t instantly be reached for remark, are additionally named as defendants.
Ms. Jonasson mentioned within the lawsuit that every one staff of the manufacturing firm had been required to signal a nondisclosure settlement stopping them from sharing something associated to Mr. Diesel.
“For years, Ms. Jonasson remained silent,” the lawsuit mentioned, “afraid to speak out against one of the world’s highest-grossing actors, afraid she would be ostracized from the industry which had a pattern of protecting powerful men and silencing survivors of sexual harassment and assault, and concerned that as a green card holder that speaking out could jeopardize her potential future citizenship.”
Ms. Jonasson sued underneath a California law handed within the wake of the #MeToo motion that opened a window for folks accusing somebody of sexual assault to sue even when the statute of limitations had run out. Her lawsuit, filed in Los Angeles Superior Courtroom, additionally alleges wrongful termination and retaliation.
