Judge dismisses defamation lawsuit against Cowboys owner Jerry Jones filed by woman who alleged she is his daughter
Alexandra Davis first filed a lawsuit against Jerry Jones last year in an effort to be officially recognized as his daughter
A federal judge in Texas dismissed a defamation lawsuit filed against Dallas Cowboys team owner Jerry Jones on Tuesday, according to ESPN’s Don Van Natta.
The lawsuit was initially filed in March by Alexandra Davis, who claimed she is Jones’ daughter. She alleged that two of Jones’ longtime associates “initiated a deliberate plan” to portray her as “an ‘extortionist’ and a ‘shakedown artist.’” She also said Jones and his representatives waged a public campaign attacking her “based knowingly on false statements and accusations.”
The lawsuit — which was also filed against Jones’ longtime lawyer, Don Jack, and family communications consultant, Jim Wilkinson — was thrown out by Judge Robert W. Schroeder III on Tuesday. Schroder ruled that some of the alleged defamatory statements made about Davis were either true or “not defamatory” and that Davis qualified as a “limited public figure.”
Davis has 21 days to file an amended complaint in the lawsuit, which her lawyers told ESPN they plan to do. Part of the lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice.
Davis, 26, filed a separate lawsuit in 2022 in which she wanted recognition that she was Jones’ daughter. She said her mother, Cynthia Spencer Davis, had a relationship with Jones in the 1990s when she was working as a ticket agent for American Airlines in Arkansas. That lawsuit, she said, was not done in order to seek money from Jones but rather to put his name on her birth certificate — something that wasn’t done after an agreement reached by Davis and Jones that stated Jones would financially support both of them but not be publicly identified as her father. Jones’ lawyers, however, claimed that she tried to extort money from him. That lawsuit was later dismissed, but Jones was ordered to submit to a paternity test.
Jones purchased the Cowboys in 1989 for $150 million. The team is now valued at $9 billion, according to Forbes, which makes it the most valuable sports franchise in the world. The Cowboys are 5-2 this season and take on the Philadelphia Eagles next week.
